
Class. 
Book_ 



rc"-^? 



^£/Z5- 



REMINISCENCES, 



SPORTING AND OTHERWISE, 



Ui 



Early Days in Rockford, 111. 



BY lOHN H. THURSTON. 



ROCKFORD, ILL.: 
Press of the Daily Republican. 

189L 






Entered according to act of Congress, in the year 189], 

By John H. Thurston, 

in the office of the Librarian of Congress, at Wasliington, D. C. 



r^OOK 1^^0I^I3. 




Doct. Josiah C. Goodhue, the subject of this sketch, of whom a 
more extended notice is given in the body of this work, and author of 
the name Rock Ford, was born at Putney, Vermont in 1803; grad- 
uated at Yale Medical College and commenced the practice of his pro- 
fession at St. Thomas, Upper Canada, in 1824, where he was married 
to Catherine Dunn. He migrated to Chicago in 1832, and was pi'om- 
inent in the affairs of that city until he came to Rockford to reside in 
1838. Doct. Goodhue was one of the founders of what afterwards be- 
came Rush Medical College at Chicago, and was elected alderman of 
the first ward at the first election under city organization in March 
1837. His daughter, Mrs. C. F. Holland, now of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, 
who has heard him relate the incident of naming the town, supplies 
me with these facts. 

During the summer of 1835, Daniel S. Haight and Germanicus 
Kent, then i-esiding at what is now Rockford, William H. Gilman of 
Belvidere, John P. Chapin and Ebenezer Peck of Chicago, and Stephen 
Edgel, afterwards of St. Louis, met at the office of Doct. Goodhue on 
Lake street in Chicago, to name the claim, or mill privilege, which 
they hoped would at some time in the future become a town. AH 
these were interested in the claim, as was Luther O. Crocker, for 
many years after a citizen of Freeport, Illinois. Mrs. Kent had sug- 
gested ''• Midimy " as an appropriate title, it being nearly equidistant 
from Chicago and Galena, which name none of the inter'ested parties 
approved. Various names were suggested and rejected, until Doct. 
Goodhue said "Why not call it Rock Ford, from the splendid rock- 
bottom ford on the river there?" It seemed an inspiration, and w:is 
adopted unanimously. 



CHAPTEK I. 

Introductory— The Team— Personnel of the Party— Good-Bye in front of the Troy 
House- Oft for the Mississippi— The Route to Chicago— Arrival at Chicago- 
Make the Acquaintance of Long John Wentworth— Two Additional Members 
Join the Party— Meet D. S. Haight and B. T. Lee— Ride an Indian Pony to 
Rockford— Swim the Kishwaukee— Simeon P. and Mrs. Doty— Big Thunder- 
Arrival at Kockford— The Landscape Surrounding the Hamlet in 183T— Loca- 
tion of each Cabin in the Place— Haight's Log Cabin— Mrs. Haight the tlrst 
White Woman in the Town — Her Remarkable Nerve — First Frame Building — 
Haighi's Barn— The Barn used for Sabbath Services— Haight's Field— Prices 
for Seed Grain— The Race Track— Water for Domestic Use— Snakes— Cook- 
ing Range— Pioneer Bedsteads— Hoosiers from the Wabash— Hoosier Bacon— 
The Wabash Hog — First Bacon and its Flavor — Enterprising Hoosiers — 
Their Dress — Traveling Equipment — Harvest in 1837 — The Blackbirds — 
Seventeen Year Locusts. 

At various times during the last thirty-five years, partial friends 
have urged me to write for publication the recollections of my boy- 
hood days which were passed in Rockford. And more recently my 
young friends with sporting proclivities desire to see in type some 
account of the exploits of the Rockford boys with like tastes, who 
were here forty to fifty years ago. 

An active boy of thirteen years, coming from an eastern city to 
a frontier settlement, would receive and retain impressions of scenes 
and events which fade from the memory of older persons. And 
further, what may be transpiring in the daily life of the inhabitants 
of a hamlet such as this was when I arrived, which this boy does not 
see or learn about, is scarcely worth looking after. The subject ap- 
pears illimitable to my mind, and I cannot hope to do it justice. Only 
those who have tried it can realize how difficult it may be to accurately 
fix the dates and details of events which happened fifty and more 
years ago, particularly where one has memory only to rely upon. It 
is my intention to write mainly of the first doings and events which 
came under my observation previous to the period when there was a 
printed account made at the time ; in many instances, they are such 
as a boy would remember most vividly, for the reason that the country, 
the people, their speech, and their manner of life, were entirely 
different from my previous experience. If, when Rockford shall 
celebrate its centennial in 1934, these reminiscences may serve to 
identify the time of events and the locality of objects, my purpose 
will have been partly accomplished, and I assure the orator of the day 
that I have made earnest efforts to write correctly. Hoping the 
reader may be a kindly critic of my crude composition, I commence 



4 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

the narrative by designating- the route of a trip in winter nearly 
fifty-four years ago, from the Hudson to the Valley of the Rock river. 

At about two o'clock in the afternoon of the first day of February, 
1837, a pair of bay Morgan horses, bobbed, as was the style at the 
time, of unusual large size for that breed, were standing hitched to a 
sleigh in front of the Troy House, on River street, at Troy, N. Y. 
The team had been selected from the livery stock of "Ike" Van 
Ornum, in the rear of the hotel. Seated in the sleigh were Henry S. 
Osborne, of New York, William P. Dennis, of Massachusetts, Henry 
Thurston, of Lancaster, Mass., and the writer (born at Glens P'alls, 
N. Y.,) of these reminiscences, then a lad of thirteen years. Grouped 
about the vehicle and on the sidewalk, were at least a hundred of 
the hotel, stage, livery, steamboat, and business men of the city. 
Some hot punch, brought out for the occupants of the sleigh, was duly 
imbibed, and my father gathered up the reins. "Git up Rob, g'lang 
Tanner," and amid a chorus of good-bye's and God bless you's, we 
were off for the Valley of the Mississippi. Ah ! old Rob and Tanner, 
in your day the best coach team on the Troy and Albany turnpike, 
little did we know of the acres of mud and water through which we 
would wallow, the miles and miles of rolling, trackless prairie in 
Northern Illinois, without a vestige of the labor of man, over which 
we would roam during the next five years. 

At .Jamestown the sleigh was exchanged for a wagon, and we went 
on through Erie, Cleveland, Perrysburg, White Pigeon, Michigan 
City, to Chicago, where we arrived on the fourth day of March, and 
atti'acted by the sign on the building, put up at the New York house, 
on La^ke street. My father, who was a hotel keeper, had for more 
than twenty years previous, followed that avocation at various local- 
ities on the Hudson, from Warren sburgh near its headwaters, to the 
city on the bay at the mouth of the stream, and possessing in an 
eminent degree the extensive acquaintance and bonhomie of the old 
time landlord, had found friends and acquaintances almost daily, from 
the commencement of the journey. 

I was up betimes the morning after our arrival at Chicago, as it 
was my duty to see that the team was properly fed and groomed. 
Returning to the bar-room my attention was arrested by the appear- 
ance of a young man then in his twenty-second year, who was stalking 
about the room in his shirt sleeves, while holding an animated dis- 
cussion with some of the bystanders. He was six feet 8i inches in 
height ; as straight as a gun barrel ; had no visible beard ; his hair 
of a light color, and looked as though he would weigh not to exceed 
150 pounds. I was familiar with the streets of New York : could 
locate the country merchants who came to the city each spring and 
fall, and readily designate the nationality of foreigners who frequented 
the port, but here was an unique specimen of the "gentilhomme," 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 5 

the like of which I liad never met, and I walked around him gazing 
at his surpr-ising- length with increased wonder at each revolution. 
With advancing years his frame filled out and he became round- 
shouldered, so that his great height was not so conspicuous, except 
when standing beside men of ordinary stature. There was a sink in 
one corner of the room, supplied with a .tin wash-basin, a dipper and 
a bucket of water. Baring his neck and shoulders, he prepared to 
make his morning ablutions. As he stooped over, I moved up close 
behind him, and standing sideways took the measure of the inside 
seam of his trousers, the top end of which was the level of my 
shoulder, where I placed my hand, and stepping back, glanced back 
and forth from the floor to my hand, while mentally calculating the 
length of those legs. A burst of laughter from the bystanders caused 
'•'Long John Wentworth" to turn around, and then and there com- 
menced an acquaintance which in later years ripened into a friendship 
only to be terminated by his death fifty-one years after. None of 
those who knew "Long John,"' by actual acquaintance or other- 
wise, will question his intellectual ability, but his personal appearance 
while a young man, before his frame had developed, was most r-o- 
markable. I can compare it to nothing more similar than a pair of 
tongs. 

At Chicago, John Truly Shaler, of Lancaster, Mass., and John C. 
Kemble, of Troy, N. Y., who had made the journey by stage, joined 
our party. In Chicago we met Benjamin T. Lee, of Barre, Mass., 
and Daniel Shaw Haight, of Bolton, Warren county, N. Y., settlers 
at Rockford. Mr. Lee was an acquaintance of my father's, and Mr. 
Haight had known him in Warren county, N. Y., when he (Haight) 
was a boy, but for some reason did not make himself known until 
some months after. It was these two men who induced our party to 
locate in Rockford. 

Mr. Haight was the first settler at Rockford on the east side of 
the river, early in the spring of 1835. He migrated from the town in 
the winter of 1847-8, and settled in Texas, near Shreeveport, La., and 
afterw^ard, in 1858-6, paid brief visits to the city he founded. I have 
never been able to ascertain the date of his death, but it is a rumor 
that he was in the Confederate army and died since the war closed at 
Ft. Worth, Texas. Mr. Leo removed to Chicago early in the forties, 
and resided in that city until his death, April 25, 1879. 

Mr. Lee traveled on horseback, and while in Chicago had pur- 
chased an Indian pony from Mark Beaubien, a noted character in t ho 
early history of Chicago, who "kept tavern like Sheol, and played 
the fiddle like the Devil," and who afterwards, in 1889-40, resided in 
Kishwaukee— "Rib Town " — at the mouth of that stream. Mounted 
on this pony and accompanied by Mr. Lee, I made the trip from 
Chicago to Rockford. We left Chicago on the afternoon of March 



6 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

10th, via the Whisky Point road, crossing the Desplaines river at or 
near what was for many years after known as Spencer's tavern, this 
being the same place where the north road from Salt Creek to Chi- 
cago now (1890) crosses the river. The prairie for 12 miles out from 
Chicago was a sheet of ice. We made 18 miles the first day, staying 
over night at the Buckhorn tavern, a popular caravansary for a 
a generation afterwards. I do not remember where we crossed the 
Fox river, but it must have been some miles south of Elgin. 

Prom Chicago to the Fox river the settlers' log cabins averaged 
about six miles apart. The evening of the second day we arrived at 
Pleasant Grove, two and one-half miles east of what is now Marengo, 
staying at the cabin of a Mr. Smith. There was but one inhabited 
house between Mr. Smith's and Fox river, a distance of about 25 
miles. It was snowing in gusts the next morning, in places oblitera- 
ting the faint trail. We rode through the grove and on the north side 
found a small cabin in which a man could not stand erect except in 
the centre, inhabited by three men, who instructed us to make for a 
point of timber six miles away, and on the opposite side of the 
prairie (Garden Prairie) where the trail was "'blazed'''' through the 
timber to the ford at Kishwaukee river, at or near the present site of 
Big Thunder Mills, probably a mile east of Belvidere. The water was 
high and the ice had gone out in the center of the stream, while on 
both banks for some twenty feet in width it was strong enough to hold 
up a horse. On the west side a passage had been cut through the ice 
and there was a canoe lying on the east shore. We tried without 
success to drive the horses through the stream, intending to ferry 
ourselves with the canoe. Mr. Lee, an accomplished horseman, 
mounted his horse and forced him off the ice into the center of the 
torrent, only getting his feet wet in the passage. I mounted my horse 
and followed. When the pony struck the water he went out of sight, 
and I was wet to my shoulders. I afterwards passed this spot in 
company with Col. J. B. Beaubien, who said the Pottawattamie trail 
from Chicago to the lead mines crossed there. We made good time 
to Simeon P. Doty's, at Belvidere, and dried our clothes. I remem- 
beV they gave me several doses of " blackstrap,'' (rum and molasses) 
then as now in good repute under like circumstances. We reached 
Rockford in the afternoon of the 12th of March. 

Mrs. Doty acted as all good women would do in similar cases with 
a boy wet to his arm pits in ice water, whose mother was a thousand 
miles away. She stood me up before a blazing fii-e, turning me 
around from time to time, while Old Doty, on hospitable thoughts 
intent, stood by with his blackstrap to stimulate me. Mr. and Mrs. 
Doty were the first settlers in Boone county, in 1835. 

Although not strictly germane to "Early Days in Rockford," 
some account of the burial place of the Pottawattamie chief, Big 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. T 

Thunder, may be of interest. His last rei'ting place was on the 
beautiful site now occupied by the court house in Belvidere, and was 
prepared in the Indian style. L first saw him in the summer of 1838. 
The body sat upon the ground facing south, and was surrounded by 
palisades about six feet high, except on the south, where they were 
lower, that he might see the whites when thej^ came, and whom he 
predicted would come from that direction. The body was perfect 
when I saw it, with the exception of the head, which had been taken 
off by Dr. Josiah C. Goodhue, (who, by the way, always did do as the 
impulse prompted,) and carried away for some purpose of his own. 
It was surrounded by fragments of clothing, arms, etc. The ribs, 
legs and arms were in position, and portio is of the flesh had dried, 
and were of the color of jerked meat. While they remained, the 
Indians made frequent contributions of am aunition, food and tobacco, 
which were placed in front of and withiii reach, for his use in the 
''happy hunting grounds."" It is a legend that when Mr. Doty's 
supply of the weed ran short, he visited tlio Chief and borrowed the 
tobacco on hand. 

In describing the town I shall have reference to the East Side of 
the river, unless otherwise specified. 

The season of 1837 opened early, and at^ the earth became clothed 
in green it presented the most beautiful landscape I have ever seen. 
Innumerable flowers dotted the scene in every direction. What is 
now the second ward was covered with tall, thrifty white oak timber. 
The fires had killed most of the underbrush, and it was a magnificent 
park from Kishwaukee street west to th j river, and from Walnut 
street south to the bluff's at Keith's creek. The trail to the ford 
wound through the south half of block 15. near Walnut street, down 
the hill in the rear of the high school building to the river bottom 
and entered the river where the present dam strikes the bank. On 
the opposite side, it left the stream nearly 200 feet below the dam. 
On the east bank below the ford was a high bluff, which at the time 
I write (1890) has been dug away at least 50 feet near the ford. This 
bluff was sodded to the water and crowned by a fringe of the largest 
red cedar trees in all the country hereabout. 

Haight cut some of these trees in 1837 for posts to use in the fence 
around his dwelling on the corner of State and Madison streets. This 
fence, with the posts, afterwards fell into the possession of the late 
William Worthington, who sold it in 188J, and afterwards told his 
son the posts were as sound as the day they were put in. I am told 
some of these posts are now in possession of H. C. Scovill of this city, 
and are in sound condition. 

Part of block 6, the whole of block 7. and the whole of block 17, 
now occupied by Thomas Scott's coal yard, and the Kenosha R. R. 
ti'acks, were covered with a dense thicket in which there was some 



8 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORO. 

lai'g'e timbei". I often killed parti'idges in this thicket, and once shot 
a wild turkey there. 

When I arrived the town consisted of Daniel S. Haight's log 
cabin on the east end of lot 6, block 16, (north-east corner of State 
and Madison streets.) The frame of the main part of his dwelling 
house on the opposite end of the same lot. The frame of the main 
part of the Rockford House, on lot 5, block 7, (north-west corner of 
State and Madison streets,) Bundy & Goodhue's store (Harvey W. 
Bundy and George Goodhue,) on lot 1, block 8, (south-west corner of 
State and Madison,) fronting east. A log cabin built for Vance's store 
on the east end of lot 4, block 15 (on First street, opposite the hay 
market.) William Penfield's blacksmith shop, a frame building on 
lot 6, block 17 (corner Market and Madison streets.) Haight's barn, 
a large frame structure, near the square (north) at the intersection of 
State and Kishwaukee streets. A log cabin about ten rods south-east 
from this barn, occupied by a family named Kingsley. Mr. Kingsley 
was a carpenter who came from Belvidere, in 1836, to work for Haight 
on the Rockford House. Mr. William H. Tinker, now of St. Paul, 
Minn., writes me he boarded with him the winter of 1836-7. They 
used a cooking stove with one joint only of iron pipe, the balance of 
the smoke conveyor being of boards that took fire, and came near 
resulting in an autodafe. James Bosswell's cabin (he came from 
Huntsville, Alabama,) at or near the east end of lot 1, block 19, 
near Jonathan Peacock's premises. Jacob Posson's cabin in the 
locality of block 21, Gregory & Penfield's addition, and a small log 
hut which stood on State street, about 75 feet south-west from Haight's 
cabin and which he used for a stable. It was originally built for 
Bundy & Goodhue, and Mr. Goodhue told me he made $1,000 selling 
goods there. (?) These were all the structures within half a mile of 
the intersection of State and Madison streets, on the east side of the 
river. 

Upon the west side of the river, my recollection is not so distinct. 
Germanicus Kent's cabin (he was the first to locate here in the fall of 
1834, and came from Huntsville, Ala.,) stood about ten rods from the 
creek and eight rods east of Main street. His sawmill on the creek 
a short distance west of Main street. There was a log hut eight or 
ten rods below the mill that had been used for a blacksmith shop. 
Wm. E. Dunbar occupied a log cabin about one hundred yards south 
from the creek and twelve to fifteen rods east of Main street. Na- 
thaniel Loomis and his son, Henry W. Loomis, (they came from New 
Jersey,) lived in a log house near the south-east corner of State and 
Main streets. Abiram Morgan's house stood on the present site of the 
Horseman homestead, the block bounded by Mulberry, North Winne- 
bago, Peach and Court streets, and there was a cabin well up on the 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 9 

bank of the river about 130 rods from State street, occupied by Rev, 
John Morrill. 

Haight's log cabin, the first structure on the East Side, was built 
early in the season of 1835 in regnlar pioneer style, without a nail, 
and a description will suffice for all such log houses. The body of the 
house, about eighteen feet square, was of oak logs with the bark on, 
the corners carried up by notch and saddle, the roof of shakes rived 
out from oak timber. The logs of the gable ends were fastened to- 
gether with wooden pins. A pole is then laid lengthways of the 
structure two feet from the eaves, the shakes laid in two or more cour- 
ses, and a pole put on top to hold them down. This process was 
repeated to the ridge pole. Short sticks were placed between the 
poles to keep them from sliding down. It had a puncheon floor, 
two windows, one door of puncheon stuff with wood hinges and 
latch, "^'the string on the outside." The cellar was simply a hole 
under the center. Haight had a cooking stove, but most of them 
had a fireplace at one end built of wood and outside ; the fireplace of 
puncheons lined on the inside with clay and the chimney of split 
sticks laid up with mud. The spaces between the logs were chinked 
with wood and mud. Such a house may be built with an axe and an 
auger, and is a warm, comfortable dwelling. Haight made an addition 
in '36, with a space between ten feet wide and roofed over, which had 
a shingle roof and floor of sawed lumber. 

Mrs. Mary Haight was the first white woman in Rockford, as 
Kent's family did not get here until two or three weeks after she came. 
She was a slim, alert, active woman, born and reared on the fi'ontier, 
with no knowledge of books or literature, but possessed of good sound 
"hoi'se sense," (I first heard this expression at that early day,) and 
of remarkable nerve, as two incidents which I had from her lips will 
confirm. 

When they first came, they put up a tent under a large burr oak 
tree standing in State street near the site of the cabin. Shortly 
after, one night, Haight's cattle stampeded for their old home on Pox 
river and he started after them the next morning with no expectation 
of being away over night. He was gone five days an4 Mrs. Haight 
with her young child staid there without thought of fear or moles- 
tation from a camp of Indians near by. There were no whites within 
forty miles, except two of Kent's men on the West Side, and the Indian 
trader, Stephen Mack, at the mouth of the Pecatonica. She once 
left the family washing on the river bank while she went to the house, 
returning just in time to see a strapping Indian buck making ofl: with 
the outfit. She followed him to the camp, half a mile up the river, 
went into the tepee and took the clothes away from him, the other 
Indians hooting in derision, "Squaw, squaw, squaw !" 
2 



10 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

Bundy & Goodhue's store was a one and a half story structure, of 
which most of the material was gotten out by hand ; the studding-, 
joists and rafters of small timber, hewed on two sides, and the siding 
and lath of split stuff. The floors and roof boards were of sawed 
lumber. This building- is now standing-, it being No. 211 East State 
street. Boswell's cabin was part logs and part split stuff. Possibly 
some among the few old timers who are still left, may remember 
"Mother Boswell's" potato pies. Were you there, Lish ? 

Hai gilt's barn, built in 1836, was quite large, having- a floor to 
thrash with three horses abreast. Thomas Lake and Sidney Twogood 
were the carpenters. They get all the material from the stump ex- 
cept the plank for the thrashing floor, and the boards to cover it. 
The timbers were massive, and it probably furnished the first "rais- 
ing" in this county. Many years after, in talking with Mr. Lake of 
the event, he said it was a wonder where the people came from, as 
there was an abundance of help. The frame of this barn still exists 
on the farm of Isaac Rowley, near the city. 

In Ijhe summer of 1837, this building was used for religious and 
other meetings. On the east and south sides it was surrounded by 
tall, thrifty white oak timbei-, with but little underbrush. A stand 
for the speaker was erected at one end, over the bay, the thrashing 
floor provided with seats made from slabs, and with the big doors 
open on a pleasant Sabbath day in summer, a more appropriate place 
for worship cannot be conceived. 

Haight's field comprised a large portion of what is now the First 
ward. It was inclosed with a stake and rider worm fence. When I 
arrived, the corn he cultivated in '36 was standing in the field. All 
the grain he had was required for seed. He sold it — wheat, oats and 
corn— for two dollars per bushel, and could readily have obtained 
twice that sum. Richard Montague (on the West Side) had a few 
potatoes which he disposed of at $1.25 per bushel. The fence on the 
south side of this field commenced at the section corner near the foot 
of the hill on State str-eet, and continued west on a straight line to 
the north-east corner of State and First streets, skirting the timber. 
This was the race track, and for a six hundred yards dash the start 
was near the section corner. Many and many a time have I been one 
of the jockeys over this course. Saturday afternoon was the regular 
race day, and the Hoosier horses were " right smart " for a quarter 
dash, the wagers ranging from drinks for the crowd to an old bull's 
eye watch._ In fact, the first collection of people of which I have a 
recollection, was a foot race of one hundred yards between one of the 
Broadies and William Bundy, at which my father officiated as one of 
the judges at the start, and John C. Kemble at the finish. 

/ Water for household use was hauled from the river in a cask 
fastened to the crotch of a tree ; for drinking water a barrel was sunk 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 11 

in the river bank about one hundred feet above State street. There 
wei'e some large springs gushing out of the bank on the west side, 
at the present site of the water works, and in summer I frequently 
went there in a canoe for a supply. A trail on each bank of the river 
extended as far as I explored, made by the Indians in their hunting, 
and in August the grass beside this trail would completely hide a man 
standing erect. Snakes were abundant. I once killed a massaugua 
(local name for rattlesnake) in the path to the water barrel. The 
hogs which ran loose soon made them scarce. 

]My father secured the Vance cabin for his family when they 
should arrive, and early in May he and I commenced house-keeping 
there, having for cooking utensils a frying pan and a large box stove. 
We afterwards secured an iron bake kettle, a most useful implement 
as I can testify, it being well adapted to bake, stew, fry, boil, washing 
dishes, and also available for toilet purposes in the early morning. 
A bedstead was constructed for my parents in a corner of the cabin, with 
one leg, the two rails being framed into the logs, and short boards laid 
across to support the bedtick filled with prairie hay. For the rest 
of the family hickory poles were used for bedsteads, an axe and an 
auger only being required for their construction. My brother and I 
went aloft on a ladder to our sleeping apartment next the shake roof, 
and when the first snow came one windy night, we woke up in the 
morning with two inches of snow on top of us. 

Our only provisions came from Chicago, Ottawa (the nearest grist 
mill), Savannah and Galena. In the early summer, the "Hoosiers 
from the Wabash" made their appearance, with droves of cattle, 
horses, hogs, and ''prairie schooners" loaded with bacon. This meat 
was most excellent as they kept it at home in the smoke house, but in 
hot weather, after a four weeks' journey in the "schooner," it be- 
came, had its population united their strength, capable of traveling- 
alone. You may ask if I ate such stuff. Well, yes, I did. Most of 
them — part of them would crawl out, and they were dead anyhow 
w^hen thoroughly fried. 

The Wabash hog of 53 years ago has become extinct, even in his 
native haunts. Possibly he may still roam in some parts of Arkansas ; 
to his credit be it said, he fulfilled his mission in life most admir- 
ably. His most striking points were head, ears, legs and tail, all of 
which were abnormally large in proportion to his body, which was 
fashioned after the pattern of a shingle and made most delicious 
bacon. With all, he had the speed of a quarter horse, as I soon 
ascertained when I tried to head him oft' while mounted on my pony. 
Late in the fall of '37, my father and Mr. Haight bought a drove of 
forty head, which were slaughtered on the spot now occupied by the 
engine house, corner of First and Walnut streets. A box was made 
for scalding and the water heated with hot stones. The meat was 



12 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

cured in bulk, and was the first put up for sale in the town. I may 
add here as a finish, that a little rust and some hair gave a flavor to 
the bacon which is now and will remain unknown to the present gen- 
eration. 

The Hoosiers of that day were an enterprising set of men, and in 
sharp business transactions could discount a Yankee from the Nutmeg 
state. Early in the summer they loaded their "schooners" with 
bacon, and with droves of stock migrated to northern Illinois, where 
they spent the season in breaking the prairie and selling their stock, 
camping out the entire time they were away from home. Retaining 
sufficient team for the "schooner," they returned via Chicago, where 
the vehicle was loaded with salt and they arrived home with the en- 
tire proceeds of the venture in cash. 

Their dress was blue jeans, the cloth made at home, and occa- 
sionally some young fellow was quite stylish in a swallow tailed suit. 
These men were most accomplished horsemen, and when traveling 
light were always on horse back. Their equipment was light, simple 
and most admirable for the purpose. They wore spurs and leggins. 
For leggins about three-fourths of a yard of blue jeans was required 
for each leg', and a good deal of skill may be displayed in putting on 
and securing them. When unusual skill was shown in the outfit, 
indicating the rider "to the manor born," he was at once taken to be 
an itinerant preacher or a horse thief, with the chances in favor of 
the circuit rider. 

The summer of 1837 was wet ; the crop was superb. My father 
cultivated a part of Haighfs field, the oats weighing 42 pounds to 
the measured bushel. At harvest time the Ijlackbirds made sad 
havoc, alighting on the small grain in numbers sufficient to break it 
down. In some localities they tore open the husks on the ears of 
standing corn. I shot and gathered nearly half a bushel of them one 
afternoon, with which my mother made a splendid pot pie. To the 
consternation of the settlers, who anticipated disastrous results, the 
seventeen year locusts made their appearance in incredible numbers, 
and have returned regularly since that year, but not to such an extent 
in this vicinity. 



CHAPTER II. 

First Lawyer, his "Wife and her Slave— The Millers— Washington House— First 
Frame Dwelling occupied by a Family— First Frame Dwelling in the County 
—Thomas Lake— Claim Fight— '' Let's go and get a Drink"— Reminiscences 
of Thomas Lake — He Sails from England in 1832— Arrives at Cleveland — Pio- 
neer Life in Ohio — Illinois Fever — Arrives at Chicago— Chicago in 1835— Ducks 
and Mud— Doctor Goodhue— Difficult to Secure Transportation— Starts for 
Rockford— In sight of Newberg— The Kishwaukee Impassable— Takes posses- 
sion of an Empty Log Cabin— Stays there Two Weeks— Nearly Drowned in the 
Kishwaukee— Arrives at Rockford. 

John C. Kemble, of our party, was the first lawyer in Rockford. 
He was a man of ability and had been a member of the New York 
State Legislature from Rensselaer county. He became insane, and 
in 1840 was taken to an eastern asylum, where he died soon after. 
His wife was a member of one of the old Dutch families of New York ; 
as was the custom of that day and time, when she was born, a 
young- slave belonging to the family was designated as her servant, 
whose special duty it should be to look after her personal welfare and 
comfort while he lived. This duty "Black Ike" (Isaac Wilson) 
fulfilled to the extent of his ability. Mrs. Kemble followed her hus- 
band to Rockford in the fall of 1837, and the following year " Black 
Ike," true to the devotion, traditions and customs of his r-ace to the 
family of whom they were slaves, came to Rockford and resumed his 
duties as her servant. 

The Kembles had two sons, both possessed of more than average 
ability. Albert, the eldest, became a painter and went to Italy to 
prosecute his studies ; was married and died there. Edward had 
literary tastes and abilities of a high order. He edited and published 
a boy's newspaper in 1840, from the office of the Rockford Star, called 
Tlie Comet. For the last forty-two years I had preserved the only 
copy of this paper known to be in existence, but when I came to look 
for it recently it was gone, cribbed, stolen. May perdition seize the 
thief ! Edwai'd went around the Horn to California with a printing 
outfit, and established the first English newspaper in San Francisco, 
2%e California Star, before that name was applied to the town. He 
was there when gold was first discovered in the state. During the 
late unpleasantness, he was a paymaster in the United States army. 
He died in New York City about four years ago, having for some 



14 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKPORD. 

yeai'S pi-evious served as news agent foi" the California Press AssO' 
ciation. 

Jacob B. Miller, ("Old Jake") the second lawyer to locate in 
Rockford, was a most eloquent speaker, and in great demand by the 
whigs of this locality during the coon-skin and hard cider campaign 
of 1840. The Millers arrived about the middle of May, 1837, and 
were prominent in the affairs of the town while they remained. They 
built the Washington House in 1838. on the east end of the lot on the 
southeast corner of State and Madison streets. The father, John 
Miller, with a second wife and three grown sons, Jacob B., Thomas 
and George. Another son, Alexander, was here in the summer of 
1838. The Millers arrived earlier than they were expected. They 
had an arrangement with Haight by which he was to vacate his log 
house for their use. Haight had a force of carpenters at work upon 
his dwelling house on the corner of State and Madison streets, who 
were set at erecting a small frame dwelling house on lot 9, block 16, 
and which he occupied as soon as it was inclosed. This was the first 
frame building occupied by a family in Rockford. The Millers had a 
small stock of merchandise which they opened in the carriage house 
attached to Haight's dwelling. They had two " prairie schooners'" 
with ox teams that were kept at work all the summer hauling mei-- 
chandise from Chicago and Savannah. Some years ago Mr. James B. 
Martyn, an Englishman, who came here from Huntsville, Ala., in 
1836, at the solicitation of Germanicus Kent, told me he erected the 
first frame dwelling in 1836 in this county, on his claim on the State 
road, one mile east of the intersection of State and Kishwaukee 
streets. 

Mr. John Lake, of this city, has kindly consented to the publica- 
tion of the following document found among the papers of his deceased 
uncle, Thomas Lake, who came to Rockford in 1835. It does indeed 
give a most graphic account of the trials and hardships encountered 
by the pioneers of early days in Rockford, and in several instances 
confirms my own recollections, which were written before I knew of 
the existence of the paper. I, too, can confirm incidents therein 
mentioned, as I knew of the buckwheat being sown in the standing 
corn. I was present at the claim fight he describes, which came off 
some two miles northeast of the town, where Mr. Brown defended 
his castle, and saw the rifle barrel protruded between the logs. My 
father had given me strict orders to sit in the wagon right there 
where he left me, and hold Rob and Tanner, but the opportunity to 
see a fight with guns was too much for my boyish nature, and I 
hitched the team to a convenient sapling and stole up Indian fashion, 
from tree to tree, to the scene of the expected battle. Early one 
beautiful morning in August twenty-three ago, I was at Charles City, 
Iowa, and stepping out on the sidewalk, the first person I met was 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 15 

"Jake" Waller, the pioneer who located on what i« now part of the 
poor farm. "Jake," said I, as I shook his hand, "How do you do ?" 
He looked at me long and earnestly, but memory gave him no recol- 
lection of the boy and the claim light. "■ I don't know you." " Well, 
Jake, the first time I saw you, we were each behind a big tree as a 

breastwork to stop a stray bullet." " You are John Thurston, by , 

lefs go and get a drink." 

It will be noticed that Mr. Lake's reminiscences close quite 
abruptly, and I am inclined to think from a conversation I had with 
him some years ago, when I told him I had prepared a paper of the 
history of my family and my early life in Rockford, for the perusal 
of my children, that he had the same object in view. 

REMINISCENCES. 

Thomas Lake was born on the fourth day of July, 1806, at Black- 
ford, in the parish of Selworth, county of Somerset, England, of 
parents named William and Elizabeth Lake. His father was a farmer, 
carrying on the milling business in connection therewith. The Lake 
homestead belonged to the estate of Sir T. D. Ackland. 

His chief occupation, up to the time of his father's death, 
soon after which he sailed for the United States, was farming. Prior 
to this time he was married to Miss Lavina Atkins, daughter of Mr. 
John Atkins, a farmer living at Whitcomb, parish of Minehead ; his 
mother was still living. 

I sailed from Bristol in May, 1832, on board the bark Charlotte ; 
the voyage was a tedious one of seven weeks and three days. We 
landed in New York at the breaking out of the cholera. There had 
been forty deaths on board a French vessel that spoke us at sea. 

I had letters of introduction to parties m New York, but the city 
was terror stricken, and business at a standstill, and no hope of em- 
ployment. We were advised to go on west ; after remaining in New 
York a few days we concluded to do so. Arrived at Troy, I soon found 
employment, but this lasted only a short time, as thousands had left, 
and were daily leaving, on account of the cholera, which had already 
reached the city, and was rapidly spreading. There was nothing 
doing, and it would not do for us to be idle. 

We had one child, born to us before we left England, Robert W. 
We concluded to go to Buffalo by canal ; the trip occupied about two 
weeks. There was another family accompanying us — man, wife and 
one child. On our arrival at Buffalo, the first thing was to look for 
some respectable tavern to stop at ; this we failed to find. Having 
come from Troy and New York, no one would take us in, where we 
could think ourselves safe until morning. Our families still r-emained 
on the boat. After looking around till tired out, and finding no hopes 



16 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

of qua,rters that looked safe, wo concluded to go on to Cleveland. 
Having made up our minds, we took passage on a schooner ; the 
weather was very rough, but the wind being in our favor, we made 
a quick voyage. 

When within signaling distance, a flag was run up at the fort, 
ordering us to drop anchor. After continuing on our course for some 
distance further, a second flag was run up. The captain took the hint 
and dropped the anchor. We soon saw a boat put out from the har- 
bor and make for the schooner. By this time the wind had abated 
enough to allow the boat to put alongside. Three gentlemen jumped 
aboard — doctors. We passed through a strict examination as to 
where we were from, where we had stopi:)ed by the way, whether the 
cholera had broken out at New York and Troy before we left, and 
where we were bound for. These questions were answered by the 
captain, and we tried to look our very best, having been warned as to 
the expected object of the visit. While the doctors were holding a 
council, the captain informed us that he probably would have to take 
us back to Buffalo, without landing his cargo. 

I was standing alone, looking over the bow, when one of the doc- 
tors approached me with the question, "Will you tell me your wife's 
name before she was married?" I told him. "Had she a brother 
named Tom?" "Yes." "Was he educated at Oxford V" "Tom," 
he said, "was my school and room-mate, but he took to law and I to 
physic." After a few minutes talk alone with his associates, we were 
allowed to land ; but people were afraid of us. We took the best 
quarters we could procure, and the bedbugs would have finished us 
had we not gotten up and dressed. We went out early to see to un- 
loading our things, not knowing what to do or where to go — dismayed 
and disheartened at our sad lot. A farmer passing by, seeing our 
luggage piled up on the ^harf, enquired where we were bound. He 
advised us to go into the country, where he lived ; told us there was 
no hope for us where we were but to spend what we had. 

So we started for Strongsville, a distance of fifteen miles. With 
much difficulty we rented part of a house occupied and owned by 
Moses Pomroy, a carpenter and joiner. I commenced mowing and 
haying for a man named Strong, who had been living here about 
twenty-five years, and had a large farm cleared off', and some good 
orchards. The heat, to me, was intolerable. I felt as though I should 
drop at my work, but I stuck it out as best I could till ha^'ing was 
over. 

My next job was harvesting for a new man, on a ten acre lot, 
cleared off' in the middle of the woods ; heavy timber of a tremen- 
dously tall growth all around us. It came on from hot to hotter ; I 
suffered dreadfully. I was binding after my employer ; he was a 
powerful man, and had informed me that it was impossible for one 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 17 

man to keep up in binding after his cradle. I had striven hard to 
keep up, but the heat was too much ; I dropped senseless to the 
ground. My employer at last saw me, and ran and picked me up, 
carrying- me into the shade of a large tree ; he administered some 
restoratives for sunstroke, and after awhile, he said, I began to kick ; 
but I was very ill, being scarcely able to stand. His neighbors blamed 
him very much, as it had nearly cost me my life. I was both sick and 
weak for a long time, but continued to work, as it was necessary I 
should do what I could, as I had found that seventy-five cents a day 
did not bring in money very fast, and left almost nothing, after pay- 
ing house rent, and buying fuel and provisions. 

After harvest there was but little work in view. We were often 
asked to buy a farm. We found a great many wished to sell, as is the 
case in all new countries, and old, too, wherever I have been. We 
were well dressed — far different from our neighbors — and our clothes 
were scrutinized closely. People in this country dress very differ- 
ently now to what they did in 1832. It was generally the rule then 
for people to live within their means. A farmer owning two or three 
hundred acres could be seen, of a Sabbath, with his wife behind him 
on horseback, riding off to meeting, with a child or two before him, 
if they were not old enough to walk the distance. Well, as we were 
well dressed, it was thought we must have lots of money ; as it was 
always thought people coming from England had. Friends flocked 
around us ; some wished to sell, some wanted to borrow. We never 
tried to convince any one whether we had much or little. "Did not 
know but that we should return in the spring," was our reply. This 
was as far down in the mystery as they were allowed to get ; in truth, 
we had but little money. Our neighbors were very kind, as I believe 
is generally the case where the land is in the market. 

About this time, winter began to look me sternly in the face. I 
was convinced that I could not clear heavy timber land at ten dollars 
per acre, which was the price then paid. 

One Sunday, after meeting, I was returning with Mr. Pomroy. 
He was extolling the advantages of a good trade. He replied, "■ What 
will you give me to show you what I know, seeing you think so much 
of a trade?" "Me to give you," I said, "is out of the question; 
pray what will you give me at the bench for the next six months? " 
"Ten dollars per month," he replied; "but you will have to board 
youi'self, pay me rent, find your own lire-wood, etc." "When shall 
I begin?" "To-morrow morning, if you wish." 

In the morning, at sunrise, the shop was all cleaned out, and I 
waiting for orders. I was put to jacking down some boards to a thick- 
ness — not an easy task for a new beginner, but I got along pretty well, 
he said. A few days after he had a lot of window sash to make. I 
was to rip out the stuff and dress it up ; he would put them together, 



18 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

he told me, and left after giving directions. I have seen sash stuff 
much better dressed, and I have seen much better sash, but they 
passed. There was always much doubt in my mind whether the stuff 
was not much better suited for kindling. 

So we dodged along into winter. I soon found that the work was 
not so hard as at first, and I could dress up pieces of stuff' that would 
go together better. We had some jobbing, alterations and repairs 
for our neighbors. He was drawing $1.25 per day when out of the 
shop, and work plenty. We always had our board when out. At or 
near spring, he took a job finishing off a tavern near Cleveland, and 
took me with him Monday mornings, returning Saturday "nights. 

One evening, after supper, I told Mr. Pomroy I believed my six 
months was out. ''You ain't going to leave me, I hope V'' "I can't 
support my family, you know, with but ten dollai's a month." " How 
much do you want'?'' "Make me an offer so I can live, and I will 
work for you till this job is finished." He made me an offer, and I 
continued on till the job was completed. He then wished me to hire 
to him for the next twelve months. I told him I was going to Cleve- 
land in a few days. 

I arrived in Cleveland a total sti-anger. Looking around me, I 
saw men at work framing a large building. I watched them until I 
thought I knew who was the boss carpenter. I asked him if he 
wanted to hire more help. "Yes, what wages do you want?" He 
made me an offer of twenty -five dollars per month and board. I ac- 
cepted, and told him my family was at Strongville. I told him 
I would be on hand on such a day, as I had no working clothes or 
tools, of which I had been buying a few. I continued with 'him the 
time agreed upon, and then quit. I had been cautioned to draw my 
pay as fast as I could, as my boss would soon break down, then I would 
lose it. The same man wanted to hire me when I left; he being 
a stranger, I thought perhaps this may be all gotten up. I had worked 
about two weeks ; on Saturday I asked him for my money. He told 
me he could not give me any. Then I told him I must quit, as it was 
quite necessary my family should have something to eat, and that 
I should have to get my pay weekly. He paid me some, and I started 
for home— fifteen miles, a nice little walk, — after sunset and a hard 
day's work. I had to get back Monday morning soon enough to com- 
mence work. Our hours then were from sun to sun in the summer, 
and till nine by candle light if the building was enclosed or we were 
in the shop, in winter, except Saturdays. I used to work my six days 
and then walk thirty miles by way of change. I had tried to get a 
house, but had failed so far. My wife was comfortably situated where 
she was, and I hated to move her until I could do somewhere near as 
well. I at last succeeded in renting some upstairs rooms, and moved 
my family in ; but when we lighted the Are we found the chimney 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 19 

was built the wrong- end down — it was a smokehouse of the first 
order, and unbearable ; so we had to do without fi)'e, and try to cook 
below, until we could do better. After a little I heard of a house that 
was going to be vacated, but it was a larger house than we needed, 
and more rent than we could afford to pay. I was in hopes the owner 
would let me part of it ; but no ; he would let me all of it, and I could 
let part, only he should look to me for the rent. We rented it. Now 
we began to live again. As we had a large house, more room than 
we needed, we soon had applicants for board. My wife concluded to 
take three or four, but found it did not pay. as she could not afford to 
set as good a table as she thought she would be able to if she had a 
greater number. So we fitted up to accommodate ten or twelve — a 
greater number had applied than we could take. Now we found we 
could set a better table and make a profit. I continued to work as 
usual. We had as happy a lot of young men as I ever saw ; all joinei's 
but one — he was carrying on a shoe shop close by. 

I became acquainted with a young Englishman, a shop mate. His 
father was taken ill, and sent for him. Told him he owned a quarter 
section of land in the vicinity of Beardstown, 111., and if he would go 
and look it up, he would give it to him, if it was worth having. He 
found it to be valuable property, with a saw mill built on it. He was 
greatly pleased with the country, and spoke of those extensive prai- 
ries, where you could plow for miles without striking stump or stone. 
This gave me the "Illinois fever." 

I had bought a piece of land, nine miles from Cleveland, on the 
state road to Columbus; but it was covered with a tremendous growth 
of timber except ten acres which I had hired cleared and fenced. I 
found I was a very poor hand with the ax; I worked one half day on 
it burning tree tops in July, and made a vow it should be my last. I 
had an opportunity to sell my interest; I had made some small pay- 
ments as they came due. The lot was 120 acres owned in New York. 

We had just began to lay up a little money, and my wife was op- 
posed to breaking up house-keeping, as we then had become comfort- 
ably fixed. But I had left my home in England with a determination 
to own a farm, if my health and strength would serve me. So at last 
with sorrow to leave our friends, we set about preparing for our jour- 
ney to Illinois. This was in September, 1835. We had a sale and 
sold off, or gave away, all our things that we did not wish to take with 
us; agreed for our passage on board the schooner Illinois, for Chicago. 
Having our things loaded upon the wagon, my wile and Robert in a 
buggy, our boarders^insisting that they would see us safely off — 
took the horses from the wagon and hauled our family and effects 
down alongside the schooner. The buggy I could not sell, excejjt at 
too great a sacrifice, and I concluded to take it along. Our boarders 
took charge of our effects till they were safely stowed on board. All 



20 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFOBD. 

things now being- ready, the schooner set sail. A fair wind soon waf- 
ted us out of sight of our true and dear friends, they still standing on 
the wharf, getting smaller and smaller, till lost in the distance. 
Then, with our faces turned toward the promised land, we had quite 
a pleasant time. The captain had agreed to board us, and deliver us 
and our effects for a certain sum. He proved to be a very good and 
kind man to us, and landed us in Chicago, October 1st, 1835. 

Chicago, then and now, look very different ; there was no ship- 
ping in the river. On our arrival, after making fast to a stump, a 
few visitors came on board, anxious to know about the staff of life- 
flour, pork and other eatables. As provisions were getting scarce, and 
many were out of these things, the vessel's small supply was soon dis- 
posed of at a big figure. We had, fortunately, laid in a supply of 
flour and pork, and a few other necessities, before we started, that 
would last us for some time. One of our visitors, named Steel — a 
hard name, but proving a very kind friend to us — wished to know if 
that was my tool chest standing on the deck. I told him it was. He 
wanted to know if I wanted to work, and if so, how soon would I be 
ready. I answered as soon as I could get a house, or room, for my 
family. I found this to be no easy task, but at last succeeded in get- 
ting shelter — it was useless to be particular in those days. The sec- 
ond or third day after, I commenced work for my new acquaintance, 
and continued to work for him till I started for Rockford, much 
against his advice, as he wished me to continue with him. Steel was 
elected and served as sheriif of Cook county after I left. 

The houses then were few and far between. The walls of the 
Lake House were up when we arrived. I worked on it for a while, 
but most of my time was spent on a brick house Mr. Steel was build- 
ing over on the South Branch, for a residence for himself. 

There were two things very plentiful in and about the city, espec- 
ially after a rain — ducks and mud ; and as I had no desire to go into 
the duck trade, I concluded to seek a more solid foundation for the 
soles of my feet. Some time late in the fall I met an old acquain- 
tance from Cleveland, a Mr. Twogood. Being out of a job, he joined 
me at the bench. Mr. Twogood and I were of the same opinion in 
regard to life in Chicago, and often talked of going out where we 
could get a farm. A compact was finally made to trust our fortunes 
together ; as he had a wife and, I think, three children, it would be 
much pleasanter for both. So it was finally decided " whither thou 
goest, I go also." 

About Christmas, my wife being sick, I called in Dr. Goodhue, 
then practicing in Chicago. I told him I did not intend to settle in 
Chicago, as my object in coming to this country was that I might own 
a farm. He insisted that I could do no better than to go to Rockford, 



KAKLV DAYS IN nOCKB'ORD. 21 

and described the locality and its surrounding advantag-es, and stated 
that he had an interest in the town. 

The greatest difficulty was in getting there. We found that we 
should be obliged to cross a number of streams — many of them quite 
large — and no bridges, except when frozen over. It had been quite 
cold, and those streams were now safe ; but, as it was getting well 
along in February, a thaw might set in at any time, and compel us to 
wait until the ground became settled, which would be too late in the 
spring. 

To hire teams for the journey was no small task. The rule with 
teamsters was to find out how much money a person had, and then, if 
possible, extort the last cent. After an agreement had been entered 
into, and signed, and everything under way, miles from any house, 
they would threaten to go no further unless you gave an embargo on 
all your effects. Fortunately we entered into a written contract ; a 
portion paid in advance, and the balance when our goods were deliv- 
ered safely in Rockford. As they were boarding at our expense, they 
were in no hurry to start mornings, and were only too willing to stop 
at night, if shelter and accommodations could be found, so we made 
but poor progress. The weather became warmer after we started, 
and the ice soon weakened. As we were crossing Fox river, one of 
our wagons broke through. We had to unload and fish out our things 
as best we could. After much labor we got our goods on the other 
side and loaded up, hoping to get a good start in the morning. But 
next morning we found a mutiny had broken out amongst our team- 
sters, and they refused to go any further. We agreed to leave the 
matter to our landlord, and abide by his decision. The contract was 
produced, and he told them they had better go on, as their pay was 
ample, if not extravagant. 

After much delay we were under way ag'ain, but the teamsters 
were sulky, and our progress was slower, if possible, than it had been. 
Thawing continued. After many delays — wagons breaking down, 
sometimes going through the ice, harness giving out — we at last 
arrived, tired and weary, in sight of Newburg. The flat was under 
water, and the ice in the river broken up and going down stream at a 
terrific rate. The teams were stopped. With great difficulty some 
of us got near enough to converse with the people on the other side. 
They told us it was useless to think of crossing, and that, possibly, 
the water would not subside for two or three weeks. Our only course 
was to submit to circumstances that were entirely beyond our control. 
We had been informed that there was an empty log house somewhere 
up the river, toward Belvidere. Sick at heart, worn out and dis- 
gusted, we started on the search. About two miles west of Belvidere, 
in the edge of a grove, we found the cabin. We took possession in 
the name of "Necessity," and unloaded our things, making ourselves 



22 EARL,Y DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

comfortable for the night — some cooking", others nailing quilts around 
the sides, to prevent ourselves from being blown through the cracks. 
It was not much of a palace, as it was only put up to hold a claim till 
some customer came along, or some friend came out from the east, or 
perhaps it was made for some prospective baby — these claims were 
many and quite extensive in those days. We had no trouble with the 
owner, as the place was for sale, and we convinced him that we did 
not intend to take permanent possession, but would move off as soon 
as we could cross the Kishwaukee, and also that we were willing to 
pay him for the shelter it afforded us. 

Our teamsters, when viewing their situation, seeing that they 
would not be able to fill their contract for two or three weeks, knowing 
and being told that they had wasted two or three days on the road and 
should have been at their journey's end before the ice went ovit, were 
changed men. After a good supper, we fixed up as comfortable as pos- 
sible, and retired for the night, and perhaps some slept soundly — but 
not all. The first to be attended to in the morning was breakfast, 
after which we settled with our teamsters. They had calmed down 
considerably from the high position they held a few days before ; but 
everything was satisfactorily settled and we parted in the best of 
fellowship. 

It kept Mr. Twogood and myself busy all that day fixing up to 
make the place comfortable. Then we began to think of Rockford. 
One man had to stay with our families, we could not leave them alone 
for fear of the Indians ; so the matter was settled by lot, and fell to 
me. It was with considerable difficulty that I got ferried over the 
Kishwaukee— this was in March, 1836— and started for Rockford. 

I was kindly received by Daniel S. Haight and wife. They had 
a double log house, but only half of it finished. The \3ther half had 
only the roof on, made of four feet shakes — neither floor nor win- 
dows, but sufficiently light and airy. I told him our situation, and he 
offered us the unfinished part if we could fix it up so as to be habitable, 
till we could do better. After partaking of a hearty meal with him 
and his kind wife, I made the best of my walk back. Perhaps it was 
the next day, Mr. Twogood visited Rockford, and received the same 
kindnesses as myself. We concluded to accept Mr. Haight's kind 
offer as soon as possible. 

We were compelled to stay in our present location for nearly two 
weeks. Getting tired of our constant trips to Rockford, and having 
but little hopes of the Kishwaukee becoming low enough to ford, we 
made arrangements with Mr. Haight to meet us at Griggsville (now 
Cherry Valley.) We were to have our things moved as near as 
possible on the opposite side. There being two canoes there, we 
lashed them together and ferried our goods across, a few at a time. 



EARI.Y DAYS IN ROCKFORD, 23 

We got our families over first and started them for Rockford, where 
they were kindly received by Mrs. Haight. 

Mr. Twogood was a steersman, I working forward. The sti-eam 
was very rough, and our impromptu ferry not too easily handled. 
About midstream we struck a snag, and in trying to save something 
from being lost in the river, I went overboard. I should probably 
have been drowned but for Mr. Twogood; he caught me as I was 
coming up the second time. We got ashore as quickly as possible. 
All of our clothes had gone on the trip with our- families, so I had 
nothing to do but reach Rockford as best I could. Mj' clothes were 
freezing stiiT, and chafing me badly. When I got through the timber 
I discovei'ed smoke coming from a new cabin, raised the day previous. 
I took heart and hurried on, with difficulty reaching it. There was 
a roaring good fire burning, but as soon as I felt the heat, I began to 
feel sick and dizzy, and darkness surrounded me. Mr. Smith, the 
owner of the cabin, came to my rescue with a little cordial, left after 
the raising. After getting thawed out and a little rested, we started 
on. Arriving at Rockford we found our families enjoying the kind care 
of Mrs. Haight. I felt next day as though I had been not only scalped, 
but skinned, Mr. Twogood and I, with the assistance of our better 
halves, busied ourselves fitting up the inner walls of our new quarters 
with blankets, sheets, quilts, etc., so that it was comfortable for the 
night. 

After we had rested and looked around for a day or two, Mr. 
Haight made an arrangement to have Mr. Twogood go on and hold a 
claim for him on shares — now known as the Holmes farm. It was 
promised and understood that as soon as Mr. Twogood's house was 
finished, he would look out a claim for me. Mr. Twogood and I 
started for the woods to get everything ready. The trees had been 
felled, hewn to a thickness of six inches, roofing gotten out, and logs 
hauled to the site. When this was done, the cabin raised and made 
comfortable, Mr. Twogood moved in. 

In the meantime Mr. Haight pointed out to me the quarter sec- 
tions where Col. Marsh, Mr. Perry, Mr. John Lake, and many others 
have since built, but there was no timber, although he thought I 
might be able to purchase a piece of timber — which I did in the fall. 
Mr. Haight gave me permission to go into his timber and take all I 
wanted for my house. As I had helped Mr. Twogood with his house, 
he helped me with mine. We felled enough timber to build a house 
18x24 feet, and got out shakes enough to cover it, and when every- 
thing was in readiness, we reported to Mr. Haight. He sent his 
teams over in the morning. We had the material hauled to my land, 
and the house raised and completed before sunset. Mr. Haight took 
full charge of the work, and is the best man on a log house I ever saw. 

My family remained in Mr. Haight's house till I had mine fin- 



24 EARLY DAYS IN KOCKFORD. 

ished, us far aa we could at that time. In leaving Chicago tlie roads 
were very rougli, so I bought two wide pine boards to prevent my 
things from being jolted out and lost. This was fortunate, for they 
were enough to make my door and sash. The house was a story and 
a half ; no floor below or above — not a board could I get. I applied 
to my old friend, Mr. Haight, to allow me to go into his woods and 
take down some bass wood trees for the bark ; this was readily granted. 
Fortunately for me, it was just at the right time, and I could get it 
off the full length across my house ; so I spread it out without much 
difficulty, and pinned it down. I doubt if any lady in town to-day 
rejoiced more over a new carpet than my wife did over hers. I got 
in a little patch for a garden. 

The first frame building was put up by Mr. Twogood and myself, 
for a store for Goodhue & Bundy, whose goods were then stored in 
Mr. Haight's log stable. It was raised as post and beam, all prepai-ed 
with the axe in the woods; siding gotten out with a cooper's frow in 
four feet lengths, shaved down to a thickness ; shingles were of oak, 
made on the spot. The building was put up on the south-west corner 
of State and Madison streets, opposite the present Y. M. C. A. build- 
ing, and was afterwards bought and occupied by Potter & Preston. 
The building now stands close to the railroad, on the south side of 
State street. 

We put up the second building, as a residence for Mr. Haight, on 
the north-east corner of the same streets ; the house and garden 
at one time occupied that whole block. It now stands at the corner 
south of Mr. J. Early. 

Then came theRockford House, opened and kept by Mr. Thurston. 

At this time settlers began to come in very fast, and the few first 
settlers felt uneasy about their claims, and some wanted to "unload," 
provided they could get their price, which was more than the land 
would bring for years after. A great many claim-holders hung around 
"seeking whom they might devour." If a wagon hove in sight, they 
would hold a council and decide what to do. A great deal of sympa- 
thy was often exhibited for the poor, tired-out family. The next 
thing was to know how the exchequer stood. If that was found to be 
low, the teams, wagons, etc., were closely scrutinized. After a little 
friendly talk the traveler would enquire if they knew where he could 
make a claim. "No, sir, it is all taken." "Why, I saw no house for 
miles on the road, in my journey over the prairies." "All taken, all 
taken ! What kind of a claim do you wish ?" On having this ques- 
tion answered, they would inform hina that he could be accommo- 
dated, possibly, if he would stop for a few days and rest, but they 
" would be too busy until to-morrow." To-morrow, if they were not 
too lazy, some one would start off with an axe, prepared to mark off 
a claim for his new found friend, extolling the country and telling 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 2o 

how fast land is going' up, till he has him well soaped and greased, 
all ready to swallow, wagons and all. 

I think there was a state law at this time, securing to an actual 
settler his claim of 160 acres, and a strong hope that congress would 
pass a pre-emption law granting 160 acres to all American citizens ; 
but it did not. 

With the large claim holders there seems to have been, about 
this time, a cloud about the size of a man's hand showing above the 
-hoiizon. They did not know how soon their boundaries might be 
lessened. "In union," it is said, "there is strength," and not know- 
ing how soon the gathering storm might burst, a meeting was called, 
and the big holders were prompt to respond. " United we stand, 
divided we fall," was perhaps their motto. A compact was entered 
into, by-laws framed and signed by the squatters, including some who 
had purchased their claims, as they felt a little sore at being so nicely 
skinned, and perhaps their purchases amounted to a section or more. 
One of those gentlemen claim-dealers, at one of the meetings, 
mounting an oak stump, delivered himself thusly : "Gentlemen, 
when we see a family come among us, we will take a look at them, 
and if their looks suit us, well ; if not, tell him he can't stay ; and 
he can't." At another time the same gentleman delivered himself 
thusly: " I have made $1,500 without dirtying my fingers." So it 
was not a bad business with some. But in looking around, where are 
many of those land pirates now V Echo answers " where V " Many 
of them did not pay their debts, and many of them do not own a foot 
of land to-day ; and some are where we do not wish to disturb them. 



CHAPTER III. 

Mr. Lake's Narrative Continued— A Mile of Fence Moved in One Night— The Field 
of Battle— Mr. Brown Defends his Castle— Stampede of the Crowd at the 
Appearance of a Rifle Barrel— A Truce— Land Speculators— The Last Piece of 
Bread — Kent Divides his Flour — Flour $22 per Barrel — Butter Required to 
Cook Pork— Greyhound Breed of Hogs— A Rifle Ball Required to Stop Them— 
First Ball— Table Service— The Menu of Bacheler's Hall— Prairie Itch— Hog's 
Ears, Snouts and TaiLs— Tailoring— First Tailor— First Blacksmith— First 
Shoemaker — Carpenters and Joiners — First Brick — First Lime — Midway — Dr. 
Goodhue Author of the Name "Rockford" — Low Prices — Couldn't Cast a 
Shadow— First Cannon— Hickory Pole— 'Rah for Jackson. 

Now do not think those large ehiim-holders had no difficulties 
among- themselves. Far from it. Occasionally they would be very 
industrious ; move perhaps a mile or more of fence, in the middle of 
the night, off their ovra claims on to their neighbor's, and have it all 
nicely laid up by morning. Then, a few nights after, those rails 
would be, by some hocuspocus, all hurled in heaps and set on fire. 
What a sight, a line of lire extending for nearly a mile, by morning 
ashes instead of rails. Then again, by way of change, while a man 
slept his whole farm would be sown, not to tares, but to buckwheat ; 
or, some poor traveler, not having money to buy a claim, would ven- 
ture, in some out-of-the-way place, to put up a cabin. Then the 
wrath of the mighty conclave would be stirred, a meeting called, a 
day appointed, and his house pulled down and burned. 

Just here a case of that kind will work in to show the height of 
our civilization. In the winter of 1837, a person arrived in our midst 
named Brown, (not John Brown, of Harper's Perry,) having a family 
of seven children, one an infant. They were but poorly stocked with 
clothes, and worse with provisions ; but then they owned a choice 
span of mares and a tolerably good wagon. Having little or no money, 
they wished to make a claim and settle down. The usual sound 
greeted their ears : " No claim, sir ; all taken. But I can sell you 
one." They concluded to look around and see if they could not find a 
spot far enough away from any one to allow them to settle down and 
live in peace. This was soon done, to his satisfaction, and there he 
built himself a log cabin, and moved out of his wagon into his new 
home, when he was informed that his castle was to be pulled down, as 
the claim belonged to Mr. Spaulding, being in St. Louis. Mr. Brown, 



EARTA' DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 27 

they soon found out, was not composed of milk and water, so to get 
him out of the way a plan was laid to entice him to Rockford under 
the pretext that a gentleman wished to buy his team. Perhaps the 
birds overheard the plans, for when the noble envoy arrived and 
delivered his message, Mr. Brown coolly informed him that he should 
be pleased to sell his team, but that he was not going to Rockford just 
then. This plan foiled, they were forced to try another — the last 
resort, and one that seldom failed. A band of the faithful was called 
together — whiskey was plenty and that made help plenty. Brown, 
by some unaccountable means, kept posted, and "prepared for an 
assault. Soon after noon on the day appointed, the faithful began to 
collect, and as the cordial passed down in full bumpers their coui-age 
rose. The teams were all ready, and the valiant crew began to fill 
the seats. Amid the blare of horns, the beating of kettles, and 
shouts, the order was given to march to the field of battle. Arriving 
at Brown's, they formed in line of march and approached somewhat 
nearer the castle. A truce was called and Brown asked to surrender. 
Brown, not seeing it in that light, opened a port and thrust out a 
musket. The ranks broke and a stampede for the woods occurred. 
Mrs. Brown began to fear for their safety, knowing the preparations 
that had been made and the determination of her husband to defend 
them to the last, that many of them would probably be killed and 
they all murdered, persuaded her husband to capitulate, if he could 
make favorable terms. Brown, still within the house, consented to 
hear their terms. "If you will leave this claim we agree to get you 
abetter one, build you a house, and furnish you with provisions.'' 
The terms were accepted and the barricade taken away, when a rush 
was made for the house, and all the efTects taken out, the house torn 
down, the logs rolled together and set on fire. The cordial getting 
low about this time, many began looking toward Rockford. Brown's 
family and effects were loaded on the wagon and taken for a short 
distance into the woods, where they were left to shift for themselves, 
the rabble returning to headquarters. 

At this time it was cold, but clear, through the night snow fell to 
the depth of six or eight inches. Some kind friends took compassion 
on them and gave them shelter for the night. On the return of Mr. 
Spaulding,he denied ever having any pretensions to ownership of the 
claim, and any one who knew him would readily believe it, for- he was 
too good a judge to accej^t any such claim, as any one could see by the 
number and quality of those he held. 

It was not an uncommon thing, in those days, for a man to use his 
employes to hold claims. It was said by some that one of Mr. 
Spaulding's claims was marked by a furrow, drawn somewhere above 
the ferry and extending to Pecatonica, including all between the fur- 



28 EARLY DAYS IN KOCKPORD. 

row and the river. The furrow I have seen, but the north end was 
too far for my curiosity ; tliere was too mucli walking to be done. 

Mr. Haight's house being pretty well under way, Twogood and I 
entered into a contract with a gentleman, well known as Charley Reed, 
to erect a tavern at the then county seat, Winnebago. According to 
the condition of the contract, the material to finish off with was to be 
sent from Chicago. Nothing was seen of Reed until late in the 
spring. The tavern was already raised. In the raising I was acci- 
dentally injured by one of the men letting fall a big maul on my 
head, in the act of catching a pin, which caused a fracture of the 
skull and laid me up for a long time, undei" the care of Dr. Whitney, 
of Belvidere. At one time it was doubted if I would recover. 

Some may think there was no organized religion at this early 
settlement. Had they attended the old settlers first meetings on the 
fair grounds, they would have been convinced to the contrary, as the 
public were then told that they, the first settlers, brought their 
religion with them. One Saturday evening one of the leaders of the 
church called at my house and inquired of my wife as to the health 
of her husband. Being informed that the doctor had just left, and 
he thought he was some little better, the good man left. The next 
day. Sabbath, there was quite a meeting held, with a strong religious 
feeling manifested, with supplication, undoubtedly, for strength, for 
there was work to be done, and that quickly, for it may be the sick 
man might recover, and there were some thousands of rails to move 
from one of the brother's claims that joined the sick man's, whilst 
he was safe in bed. After much praying and little fasting, as the 
work had to be done that night, the brethren were dismissed, to meet 
again later in the evening. True to agreement, all were on hand 
except one, as report had it ; he, the poorest of the brethren in 
worldly goods, refused to attend, as he thought their deeds were evil, 
consequently he was stricken from the rolls of the brethren, and told 
to ask no favors. The sick man's wife, having had but little rest 
during the illness of her husband, and he feeling a little better, 
slept soundly. The first thing on going to the door about sunrise 
Monday morning, she saw a fence running near the house leaving 
about fifteen acres ; there was up to this line eighty to ninety acres 
on his claim, and the greater part laid to seed, but this was disre- 
garded, and his fence was thrown on one side when in the brethren's 
way. The sick man recovered, and went on to fence, paying but 
little attention to the night woi-k. He had all his fence put up and 
his crop planted on about forty acres. Now came the tug of war. 
After the crop got up, whilst the owner was at work, the fence would 
often be pulled down and the cattle turned in ; if the water was high 
enough, one of the brethren would throw the rails into the creek and 
another would stand below and haul them out, as they floated down 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 29 

stream. Working- hard by day and watching- cattle nig-hts, and some- 
times having to rebuild forty or fifty rods of fence, did not add to his 
strength or mellow his temper. He began to doubt if it would hold 
him in check much longer. At this juncture, an old man named 
Clark, known afterward as the " Old Johnny " Clark, dropped into the 
building, inquiring for work. After thinking a moinent I determined, 
if it was possible, I would save a part of my crop. After telling him 
I could give him work, and explaining to him what I wished him to 
do, and its difficulties ; that he was to watch my crops nights, keep 
up the fence if possible, to do what he chose through the day, sleep 
as long as he wished — I to furnish a horse, board and washing for 
him, and $16 per month. It was just the thing that suited him he 
said. His being up nights was no objection, as he he was an old man, 
and was weak, and rather liked the fun. There were always refresh- 
ments set on the table at our retiring at night. *■' Old Johnny '- would 
come in, help himself quietly — sometimes we did not hear him — 
and then quickly mount his horse and go his rounds. Sometimes he 
said he would not be over fifteen minutes, and perhaps thirty to fifty 
rods of fence would be pulled down, and thirty to foi-ty head of cattle 
turned in. He would get awful mad, and beg me to let him have my 
gun — he would make a fence, he said. "No sir; I pay you your 
wages. You can have no gun of mine ; you would get into trouble. 
I hire you to keep me out of trouble." At last, lightning had struck 
a pair of oxen, and in burying them, marks of galena were found, 
and I supposed a mineral abounded on the claim. Cattle did not 
trouble me much after that. This claim ended in a law suit, but the 
brethren could not all get on the jury, and so failed to agree. So the 
law suit ended. 

I have more than fifteen acres of land now, and have so far, paid 
my debts. That is more than some of those midnight brethren have, 
or have done. This is but a very light sketch of the proceedings of 
those days. But I will try to abide by a certain injunction a lady 
gave the speaker appointed at the first Old Settlers' meeting, "Don't 
tell all you know." But as the name familiar in those days, of 
"Charley Reed'" is but little known to the present inhabitants, we 
will just look at him a little. Friend Charley was quite a pleasant 
old gentleman, lived perhaps somewhere about .Joliet, rode a good 
horse, was well but plainly dressed, carried a small hatchet— perhaps 
it was not the one Washington cut down his father's cherry tree with, 
but a hatchet. Thus equipped, his periodical wanderings were over 
the prairies and through the woods, from Fox river to Apple river, 
and often beyond, selecting and marking claims, of which he was a 
good judge. The mark of his hatchet he could jwint out to you on 
many choice pieces of timber; on the prairie it was more trouble, as 
perhaps it would require a few poles, or rails, if a very choice and 



30 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

large one ; sometimes it was taken possession of by merely riding 
across. These long journeys were undertaken as often as business 
required his pi-esence, or to sell oft' a piece occasionally. As Charley 
was a good judge, in his absence some one would settle down on his 
claims, build a house, plow, etc. This would start ( -barley's ire. He 
would get cross and threaten vengeance; he would bid in the land at 
the land sale if you did not hand over a thousand or so. This was 
vexation of spirit, and he must keep some one to attend to his busi- 
ness about Rockford, as it could not be expected of a man to be at Fox 
river, Apple river, and all intermediate points, at one and the same 
time. His son was sent out and established at Rockford and vicinity 
— a very nice and agreeable young man. As he and the writer often 
worked together, I got well posted on his father's business. But 
many, not having the fear of Charley before their eyes, still trans- 
gressed by making homes of some of his waste land property ; and at 
the land sale Charley's cash run low, as was the case with many 
others at the land sale. But few of the actual settlers were prepared 
with money. Of stock and grain many had plenty, but neither could 
be sold for money. If any one owed you he would not pay, as money 
was worth thirty per cent. Some had their claims bid in on shares, 
and much more was bid in by monied men, on condition to double in 
three years — 33i per cent. — the one furnishing the money as his own, 
and giving a bond to the claimant to redeem at the expiration of three 
years, if the money was paid prior to or on that day. The money 
leaner fully supposed his title was good, as it was entailed in his own 
name and paid for in full with his money ; but it was decided other- 
wise by the supreme court ; it was treated as a mortgage. There was 
much lawing on the question, and much money spent. 

Many of the foregoing remarks would not have been made, had 
not some writers endeavored to make it appear that all was harmony, 
good feeling, and peace and quietness in those days ; but how often 
could the heavens be seen lighted by the destruction of some poor 
man's cabin, where he had toiled and fought both hunger and cold, to 
make a home for the little ones, and on this very claim, prior to his, 
there was no mark to show that a man had ever set foot. Such is 
life! 

At times, provisions ran very low. I remember, returning from 
my work on Mr. Haight's house one evening, I had had no dinner ; 
my wife set a small piece of bread on the table, and a little butter, 
and a cup of tea, with the remark, "I don't know what we shall do, 
for that piece of bread, and what I am to bake," which she had made 
up ready for the oven, "is all we have." The loaf, or cake men- 
tioned was about the size of a pint bowl. I knew we were running 
short, but did not know we were so reduced. I left the table imme- 
diately, without tasting a. mouthful, returned to Rockford and called 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 31 

on Mr. Haight and stated our situation. I was sorrowfully told by 
him that he could not possibly help us in the least, as he was situated 
much like ourselves. I started for the river and hailed a boat. When 
I was ferried across, I made for Mr. Kent's and told him as I told Mr. 
Haight. The same reply, "I can't help you with a pound. Come 
and see.'' He lifted the cover from a flour barrel and stated how 
many he had to feed, and knowing well, if either had any to spare I 
could get it in a moment, I turned away sorrowfully to return. Mr. 
Kent plainly saw my suttering of mind, and called me back. 
" Mr. Lake, you shall not go so ; I will let you have a little."' I held 
open a little bag, he took a very little plate and dipped out of the 
barrel a few times, looking closely after every dip, knowing he was 
doing what he ought not to do in justice to himself. Weighed it ; 
there were twelve pounds. I asked the price ; he hesitated, at last he 
said one dollar and fifty-five cents. I never paid money, I think, so 
cheerfully as I did this. A few days after I saw a large Hoosier wagon 
coming down the hill toward the river. Hope bind fear were about 
equally balanced in my mind. They may have flour on board. Before 
they fairly stopped, I hurriedly asked, ''What have you on board ? " 
''Flour." " What do you ask V" " Twenty-two dollars per bari-el." 
"Roll me out thr-ee barrels." Here I made a mistake, for it soon fell 
to $16, but I had flour. Having hands to work for me it was necessary 
to have meat also. I started for Savana with a team ; there I bought 
some i^ork and other necessaries of a Mr. Brown. Hoosier pork, 
smoked black, about the thickness of a man's hand, and resembled a 
piece of old oak slab that had lain around for years ; but we found 
butter would cook it. At another time, standing below the old Rock- 
ford house site, in company with a man named Strand, who had 
arrived with a drove of hogs of the greyhound breed, to be fattened 
on prairie grass, or what they could pick up, our supply of meat 
about out, and one of them cropping grass in the road, and having a 
good rifle in his hand, and being a good shot, I asked him what he 
would take for that hog. "A shilling a pound," he answered, "just 
as he is." " Stop him," I said — no sooner said than done. He was a 
racer, and nothing short of lead con^d overtake him, as he was 
making two-forty for the brush, but he dropped with a squeal. I 
hooked him on Mr. Haight's steel-yard ; handed over Mr. Strand one 
shilling a pound, and got him loaded for home. When dressed he 
would have made a good lantern, much better than for cooking. It 
was a sad excuse for pork, but with difficulty we picked his bones. 

The first ball in Rockford was held in Mr. Haight's new building, 
at his request. Had to remove the partitions and remove our benches 
and materials, doors, casings, etc., to make room. Quite a crowd 
attended from a great many miles around. It was a benefit for Mr. 
Thurston, as he had leased the Rockford House when built, Mr. 



32 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

Thurston's family not being here, Mrs. Haight, Mrs. Tvvogood and 
Mrs. Lake, and perhaps some others now forgotten, did the coolving. 
The materials were furnished by Mr. Thurston. Table service being 
short, small pieces of board answered the purpose of trays, plates, 
etc. Had a good time, and dancing kept up until the small hours. 
The arrangement could not have fallen into bettor hands than 
Mr. Thurston, as this was not his first attempt at providing for a 
jovial party, but not always carried out in such splendor and display, 
perhaps, as on this occasion. Could it be acted out again now, in the 
same style, it would require a larger hall than Brown's the second 
night, so perhaps it had not best be attempted till tlic walls of the 
new court house are up." 

While my father and I were keeping bachelor's hall in the Vance 
cabin, as will readily occur to the reader, our bill of fare was limited. 
We had no vegetables, and aside from an occasional duck which I 
potted in the river, the menu coinprised, for breakfast, fried bacon 
and bread ; for dinner, bread and bacon fried ; and for supper, some- 
thing that might be quickly got together, which visually was some 
preparation of bacon. We had fish lines set on the bank of the river 
and occasionally got a cat fish. There was a species of wild onion 
growing on the banks of the river, about half the size of a lead 
pencil, which I gathered and ate with avidity. 

One institution peculiar to 1837-8, has never been recorded to my 
knowledge— " The Prairie Itch" ! ! ! Soon after our arrival I inno- 
cently asked my father "what was the matter with Mr. Haight's 
hands." ''He's got the itch, you little fool, and don't you open your 
head about it." Everybody had it ; I had it, my father got it before 
I did, being required to shake hands, my brother had it, my sister 
caught it, we all were afflicted except my mother, who escaped. It 
was epidemic. "Old Frost," who was a Jack at all trades, and 
professed to some knowledge of medicine, made an ointment that 
was, I think, some decoction of tobacco, and did temporarily ease up 
the scratching, but it was universal until the arrival of Dr. Goodhue, 
in the fall of 1838, when he made anguintum by the pailful, and 
exterminated the malady. ^ 

Mr. S. D. Gregory has supplied me with a copy of a letter wr-itten 
in December, 1836, by his father, Samuel Gregory, to his brother in 
Lockport, N. Y., in which ho mentions not only the prairie itch, but 
also various interesting items of pioneer life, which is here appended : 

ROCKFORD, 111., Dec. 20, 1836. 
Dear Brother Ephraim: — With pleasure I now spend a little 
time in writing to let you know that we are yet alive, and amidst sur- 
rounding mercies enjoying good health, excepting colds and the prai- 
rie itch, which is some like having the seven year itch all at once; we 
are getting better of that. We are well suited with the country, for 
a more excellent soil of land I have never seen; I have fears that win- 
ter wheat will not do well, the winters are so open that it kills out. 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 33 

I have sown five bushels foi' a trial. Summer crops grow abundantly. 
Have been hauling rails to fence 160 acres, on which I have 30 acres 
broke. Wages are from $20 to $25 per month for the year. Pro- 
visions are very high— flour $15 to $20 per barrel. Hoosier hog meat 
$8 per hundred. Beef five and six cents per pound, of which we use 
much. The weather is cold ; about eight inches of snow. 

If you can find two or three men that will come to Illinois and 
work for us, we will pay them $17 per month by the year ; if good 
hands will pay their expenses if they come within six months. Tell 
brother Harry if he can collect some money on the notes I left him, I 
would like to buy some cows, as butter and cheese bring a big price. 
Cheese Is. 6d., butter 25 to 35 cents per pound. Tell Harry to send 
large bills, cutting them in two and directing one package to Eliphe- 
let and the other to me. Hoping to see you soon. 

Your brother, 

Samuel Gregory. 

At Mr. Benj. T. Lee's place on the Cherry Valley road, where it 
meets the timber, he had three men employed. When I arrived the 
only meat they possessed was a barrel of hogs' ears, snouts and tails. 
I was there sevei*al days while this meat was being consumed, and 
can testify to the good quality and generous proportions of the tails, 
but the ears, like the tails as to size, were stringy, and the snouts 
most unwieldy objects to carve, being of the consistency of India 
rubber when not thoroughly cooked, which was sometimes the case. 
Fortunately we did not depend on store teeth. 

We had a cow, and at a time when the hired man was unable to 
work in the field, he and I determined to have some butter. Securing 
a small amount of cream, we stirred it with a spoon in a pitcher, at 
intervals, for a day and a half before we succeeded. This was the 
first butter I saw in Rockford. From necessity we had traveled with 
a light amount of baggage, and soon after my arrival the seams 
ripped of the only pair of trousers I had. Mrs. Haight supplied me 
with thread and needles, and retiring to a sequestered place I doffed 
the garment and made my first essay at tailoring. I sewed them 
over and over, making a round, whiplash-like seam, which although 
somewhat inconvenient when I sat down, was substantial. 

The first tailor in Rockford was William H. Tinker, from Massa- 
chusetts, now of St. Paul, Minn., who was here in 1836, but not finding 
the outlook promising, had abandoned the field. Mr. Parson King- 
Johnson, from Brandon, Vermont, now of Mankato, Minn., came here 
in June, 1837, and writes me he found Tinker's cutting board in the 
back rbom of Bundy & Goodhue's store. Mr. Tinker returning soon 
after, they joined forces, and the firm of Tinker & Johnson (Little 
Johnson,) blossomed as the first business house in that line in the 
town. They occupied the upper room in a building on the site of 
111 South Madison street. 

The first blacksmith, I presume was one of Kent's men, and I 



34 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

have previously located the log hut used for a shop. William Pen- 
field was the only blacksmith when I came ; his shop I have elsewhere 
located. William P. Dennis, of our party, was the first house painter, 
and his work in 1837 upon Haight's dwelling, opposite the Rockford 
House, was not equalled for some years after. 

The first shoemaker was Ezra Barnum, from Danbury, Conn., 
(the father of Anson Barnum, afterwards a prominent man in the 
county,) who arrived early in the summer of 1837. There was no new 
leather to be had, at least I concluded so, for I remember some 
repairs he made upon my shoes, using old boot legs. 

Of house carpenters and joiners, it may be difficult to decide who 
were the first, but I think Thos. Lake and Sidney Twogood may 
claim to have been the first skilled workmen. They built Haight's 
barn and his dwelling house, the house having a winding stair and 
banister rail. This house is now standing on the northeast corner of 
Second and Walnut streets. 

Cyrus C. Jenks made the first brick in the fall of 18,S7 at his 
claim in Guilford, about three and a half miles northeast of the town. 
This question of the first brick came up some fifteen years ago, and 
as illustrating the vivid recollections of a boy, none of the early 
settlers could identify the maker until I stated it was the first brick 
kiln I ever saw. Most of these brick were used for chimnies. The 
first brick house in the county was a small, one story square structure 
on the southeast corner of block 18, on First street, opposite the 
public square, built in 1838 by a Mr. John H. Morse, who soon after- 
wards went to St. Louis to reside. 

Mrs. Harriet Hard, of Guilford, supplies me with this item in 
regard to the first lime burned in the county. " Giles says the lime 
used to plaster Bundy & Goodhue's store was burned on a pile of logs 
heaped up near the northwest coi-ner of the Cedar Bluff cemetery, by 
one of the Boswells. He piled limestone on the log-heap and set the 
timber on fire, obtaining sufficient lime to use about the store. This 
was in the fall of 1836. In the spring of 1837, Deacon Holt, of West- 
field, burned a kiln of lime which turned out about 200 bushels, dis- 
posing of the entire lot to Daniel S. Haight and Giles, who was in 
Haight's employ, hauled it to Rockford, where it was used upon his 
dwelling and the Rockford House." A word here about the name 
" Midway" as designating the town in the 30's, and so persistently 
advertised by the city editor of one of the local papers. I never 
heard the name until recent years, and have it from James B. Martyn 
personally, that Kent, in writing to him at Huntsville, Ala., stated 
the locality as about midway between Chicago and Galena, and 
suggested that Midway might be a good name for the embryo town 
which he hoped would some day prove a reality. It will be seen by 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 85 

Mr. Thomas Lake's reminiscences, the town bore its present designa- 
tion v/hen he arrived. Doctor Josiah C. Goodhue, who came here 
from Chicag-o in the fall of 1838, and who was interested in the town 
plat on the East Side, was author of the name Rockford, and it was 
so called when I arrived. 

The immigration to this locality in the years 1837-8 was simply 
immense, a regular "boom.'' The roads were thronged with immi- 
grants, many of them driving cattle, horses and hogs, and as each had 
a little money, trade was excellent. How sadly this fell off may be 
appreciated, when I state that in the fall of '40, a bushel of wheat 
could not be exchanged for a pound of loaf sugar. Wheat was accept- 
ed by the local dealers for drj- goods, but cash was required for gi'O- 
ceries. An excellent cow could be purchased at from eight to ten 
dollars, a good horse for forty, or practically at such price as the cash 
buyer chose to dictate. 

In the early forties the people of this county were so poor they 
"couldn't cast a shadow,'' to use a most appropriate expression of 
"Judge" E. S. Blackstone. I venture to say that in 1841-2 there were 
not twenty farmers in the county who possessed a suit of clothes suit- 
able to wear to church or to court, which they had purchased with 
the avails of labor on their farms. Alas for those among the settlers 
who had passed their prime physically. Too old to withstand the 
hardships of pioneer life, they sickened, and in some instances they 
straggled back to the old homes at the east to die. Among the latter 
were my own parents, leaving me in 1842 to fight the battle of life 
alone. Was I contented and happy? Yes I was; a boy with a shotgun 

The first cannon used in the town we made ourselves. When I say 
"we," I mean that I personally assisted in its construction. Wm. 
Penfield's anvil had a hole in the bottom and we drilled a touch hole 
to the implement, making a safe piece of ordinance to be used for the 
first Fourth of July celebration in 1837, which was indeed a grand af- 
fair, not exceeded since then in noise and patriotic demonstrations. 
As preliminary to the event a young cow was purchased early in the 
summer for a meat supply, and shortly before the day, Giles C. Hard 
(still among us,) went to the woods for a pole. Giles' predilections 
were for an ash pole, the emblem of the whigs, but being a young 
man in those days, not so wise as he has since become, he was over- 
persuaded by older and possibly more sagacious democrats, who 
insisted that the event to come oft' had no political significance. He 
returned with a hickory pole, which being placed in position, the 
crowd by previous arrangement gathered about, and to the infinite 
chagrin of Giles, as the stars and stripes went aloft, burst out, in 
which I heartily joined, with, " 'Rah for Jackson, 'Rah ! '" 



CHAPTER IV. 

First Fourth of July Celebration— Tickets One Dollar— Zip Coon—" Jake, for 's 

Jake, don't Play so Fast"— First Rope for Ferry— First Dancing School—" Go 
Ahead, First Four "—" Couldn't git to Dance with Her"— First Drug Store- 
Seventy Grains of Calomel— First School— Early Teachers— Rockford House 
Opened— Actors, Authors, Poets— Sobriquets— Claim Jumping— " China " Par- 
ker—Electrical Disturbances— Rings on the Prairie—" The Buffalo Made 'Em 
—First Butcher— A Banker Fisherman— First Circuit Court— First Court House 
—Distinguished Lawyers— Long John's Maiden Speech— "To Congress, by 
"'—Hon. R. R. Hitt's Letter— Postmaster General's Letter— First Post- 
master-First P. O. Building— No Key to open the Mail-bag— P. O. Box 1(X)— 
Joe Jefferson. 

My father, with such assistance as I could render, cooked the 
dinner in Mrs. Haight's large iron kettle. It was of bread and beef, 
a la mode and otherwise. The main part of the Rockford House had 
the roof on and was sided up to the first story windows ; some loose 
boards were laid for a flooi', tables erected, and the cold meat served 
on clean shingles, for want of crockery. There was an occasional 
butcher knife for carving purposes, but each guest was expected to, 
and did provide his own cutlery, Tickets were one dollar each, and 
as every patriot of the male persuasion became a purchaser, the 
result proved a financial success. The morning of Independence. Day, 
18o7, was ushered in by the boom of the cannon fired as rapidly as 
the gunners could load it. The speaking was done in Haight's barn, 
the bay being floored over for the speakers, and the threshing floor 
occupied by the ladies and distinguished (?) guests. Charles I. 
Horseman read the Declaration of Independence and John C. Kemble 
was orator of the day. The whole wound up with a grand ball, the 
first in Winnebago county, held in Haight's house. Some shirting 
was tacked to the studding about one room for a ladies' dressing room, 
and with an orchestra of three fiddles, led by Old .Take Miller, whose 
only dancing tune was Zip Coon, " the mirth and fun grew fast and 
furious," every little while some perspiring fellow rushing to the 
orchestra and exclaiming, "Jake, for 's sake, don't play so fast." 

The first rope provided for the ferry, was about the first of June, 
1887, as I I'ecollect hauling lumber from Kent's mill at that time, and 
also that the rope was new. It was fastened to a burr oak tree on the 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. S7 

east bank about one hundred feet above State street, and to a frame 
work on the west shore. In warm weather we usually crossed at the 
ford, tlie water coming- just above the forward axle of a wagon, not 
varying more than six inches in depth for the entire distance. 

The young people among the early settlers were most devoted 
followers of Terpsichore, the result being that " Old Hayes,'' (Andrew 
Lovejoy,) who was an accomplished musician, secured a large'number 
of scholars for a dancing school, the first in the county, in the winter 
of 1887-8. The Hoosiers not having been trained in the square 
figures which the Yankees introduced, were the cause of some 
ludicrous incidents. One of them, who with his girl always came on 
horseback, was on the side set of a cotillion for the lirst dance. As 
the music started he sang out, *•' Hayes, Hayes, hold on ; wait till I 
git my pumps on ! '' He sat down on the bench behind him, took his 
pumps and stockings from his coat tail pocket, pulled oflF his boots 
and stockings, kicked them under the bench, and as he drew on the 
second stocking called out, '' Go ahead, first four, I'll be ready ! " On 
another occasion, a young fellow who brought a pretty girl whom the 
town boys were disposed to monopolize, had been unable to secure her 
for a partner during the evening, and the last set was on the floor. 
The case being desperate, he accosted her partner, exclaiming, " Tut 
you've got my gall. I fotched her clean all the way from Kishwauk 
and couldn't git to dance with her yit ! " 

The first drug store was opened early in the summer of 1838, in a 
small frame building on the north side of State street, about eighty 
feet from the. river shore, by a Doctor (?) Marshall, a Scotchman, 
who I have recently learned was a genuine quack, and who probably 
made it go hard with some of his patients. He was called to prescribe 
for Doctor Haskell, who refused to take his medicine, which proved 
to be 70 grains of calomel. 

The first school in this county was held on the site of 110 South 
Second street, by Miss Eunice Brown, in a log cabin, at which my 
brother attended. Another scholar I recall was Miss Mary Barnum 
(she became the first wife of the late Jonathan T. Miller,) a daughter 
of Ezra Barnum. A most complete list of the schools of Rockford 
■was compiled (and is here inserted) with much labor and care by my 
deceased wife for publication in the Rockford City Directory for 1869 
which may be accepted as substantially correct. It was a subject in 
which she felt warmly intei-ested, and but for her labor at that time 
many of the facts related would have been lost. 

From the Rockford City Directory for 1869 : 

"A lady of this city who has lived in or near it from its earliest 
times, deeming that it should be known that education has always 
received encouragement here ; that we have always had good schools 



38 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

and that the public interest in education did not commence with the 
present school system, has, at a very considerable expenditure of 
time and labor, obtained the following- school statistics of the city, 
showing as far as she could get, the proper information, the names of 
all teachers who have taught in Rockford, and the time and place of 
teaching, which we have endeavored to put in proper shape for pub- 
lication. 

"Miss Eunice Brown, now Mrs. J. G. Lyon, of the town of Rock- 
ton, in this county, was the first teacher who taught a school here. 
She first taught in the summer of 1837, in a log cabin that stood on 
the premises now owned by Mr. John Early, near the southeast 
corner of State and Second streets, east side, and afterwards on the 
west side in several different places. 

"■ Miss Prances Bradford also taught school in 1837, on the west 
side, in a log cabin belonging to the late Wm. E. Dunbar, that stood 
a short distance south of the present residence of S. C. Withrow, in 
South Rockford. These two ladies were the pioneer teachers of the 
city. 

'' Israel Morrill and Miss Sarah E. Danforth taught in 1838 on 
the west side. Miss Wood in 1839 on the west side, Jas. M. Wight in 
the winter of 1838-9, in a building on the corner of Main and Market 
streets, east side, the present site of the American House, Miss Hyde 
in 1839, in the same place, Andrus Corbin in 1839, in a house owned 
by himself, on the west side, Mr. Jackson in the winter of 1839-40, in 
the house corner of Main and Market streets, east side, Miss Hepsa- 
beth Hutchinson and Miss Maria Baker in 1840, on the east side, Mrs. 
Mary Jackson in 1838-9, on the west side, Miss Wealthy Bradford in 
1841-42, on the west side, Lewis S. Sweezy in 1841-2, in the brick 
school house that stood on the southeast corner of the public square, 
east side. Miss Harriet Barnum in 1841, in a private house, east side, 
Miss Minerva C. Fletcher in 1842, in a log house that stood opposite 
the First Congregational church, east side. Elijah Holt in 1841-2, in 
brick school house, east side. John Paul in 1841, in the first house 
south of the railroad. Main street, west side. Lewis B. Gregory in 
1843-4 in brick school house, east side. Miss Fronia Foot and George 
Waterman in 1843-4, Miss Julia Barnum in 1844, in private house, 
east side. Miss Adaline Warren, private house, east side. Miss 
Augusta Kemfield in 1845, east side. C. A. Huntington, from 1845 to 
1849, in the old court house that stood on the northwest corner of 
Market and First streets, east side, and from 1849 to 1851 in the Bap- 
tist church, west side. Miss Elizabeth Weldon. assistant to Mr. 
Huntington. H. H. Waldo in 1848, in Baptist church, west side. 
D. W. Ticknor from 1846 to 1849, in the brick school house, 'southeast 
corner of public square east side assisted by Miss Elizabeth Weldon, 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 39 

Anson Barnum, John W. Andrews and D. Dubois. H. H. Waldo in 
1849-50. Miss Hannah Mori-ill in 1848, east side. Robert A. Sanford 
in 1848, west side. 

"•The Rockford Female Seminary was first organized in May, 1849, 
under the present efficient principal, Miss Anna P. Sill, with the 
Misses Hannah and Eliza Richards as assistants, and Miss Melinda 
Richards in 1850. They occupied the old court house, east side. 

"Mr. Bowles in 1850, in the brick school house, east side. Mrs. 
Squiers in 1850, in what is now No. Ill Main street, east side, after- 
wards on west side. Mrs. King H. Milliken in 1850, east side. Miss 
Mary Dow, Miss Delia Hyde and George E. Kimball in 1850 to 1853, in 
basement of the Baptist church, west side. Miss Sarah A. Stewart 
and Miss Mary Joslin in 1850, in a building where the Holland 
House now stands. Seely Perry in the basement of the Second street 
Methodist church, east side; quite a number of his pupils pursued the 
usual studies of the Freshman class, and entered Beloit College one 
year in advance. B. Rush Catlin in 1852, in the basement of the 
Second street Methodist church, east side. Misses Charlotte and 
Harriet Leonard in 1851-2. Miss Stowell and T. J. L. Remington in 
1851, in the brick school house, west side. Rev. C. Reighty in 1852, 
on the east side. Miss Fanny Avery in 1852 on the east side. Mr. 
Stevens in 1853 in the brick school house, east side. In the Classic 
Institute, located in the basement of the Baptist church, on the west 
side, from 1853 to 1856, of which Henry P. Kimball was principal, one 
class pursued the usual studies of the freshman year in college and 
entered one year in advance. A score of students left this institution 
and entered eastern colleges. Two years study was considered suf- 
ficient to advance scholars thi^ough a full preparatory course of mathe- 
matics and the usual books in Latin and Greek, giving them a thor- 
ough and sufficient preparation. Miss Lizzie Frow, in 1853, on the 
east side. Mrs. Carpenter, in 1853 on the west side. Rev. L. Porter 
in 1852, Mr. Stowell in 1853, Rev. Addison Brown and Miss Prances 
A. Brown in 1854, in a school house built by .John A. Holland, south 
of the residence of T. D. Robertson, west side. Miss Julia Galloway 
in 1854, in lobby of the First Congregational church, east side. Dar- 
win Dubois, in 1854, in Second street Methodist church, east side. 
Mrs. Julia and Miss Chapman in 1854, on west side, Miss Belle Burpee 
and Miss Ethalinda Thompson, in 1855 on the east side. Halsey G. 
Clark in 1855, in the old court house, east side, with Miss Lizzie Giffin 
as assistant. Miss E?nma Brown in 1857 on the east side, Free- 
man in the basement of the Baptist church west side, Wesley Sover- 
eign in Second street Methodist church, east side. Mrs Jones on west 
side. Miss Elizabeth Fisher, west side, Miss Gunsolus, east side, Mr. 
Johnson and Mr. Gilford, west side." 



40 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

Late in the fall of 1837, the wing of the Rockford House was fin- 
ished and Henry Thurston opened the hotel, it being the first framed 
structure erected for hotel use in Winnebago county. There was no 
way of getting to the third story of the house which was divided into 
two rooms, except by a ladder made from slats nailed to two pieces of 
the studding in the first story of the main building. It was a part of 
my duty that winter to make the beds and escort the guests of the 
house up that ladder when they retired. I was specially charged not 
to drop the melted tallow from the dip which I carried up the ladder 
onto the party who followed me. 

We were wholly dependent upon ourselves for amusement in those 
days, even the circus was yet in the distant future. The long even- 
ings in winter were tedious. We had but little to read and although 
we played whist, seven-up and some of the boys played a strong hand 
at a game similar to what is now draw poker, still at times, it was ex- 
ceedingly dull and vai-ious expedients were resorted to by which to 
while away the hours. Possibly we might never have known of the 
dormant talent in our midst, had not necessity brought it out. We 
had actors, authors, artists, orators and poets of ability, and we 
graduated — at least some of us did — into a community of story tellers. 

Every fellow, old and young, had his sobriquet, to which he re- 
sponded as promptly as when addressed by his proper name. 1s'[y own 
was "Uncle John," to my infinite annoyance. Among those I recall 
there was Old Hayes, (after the noted thief catcher in New York,) 
Big Johnson, Little Johnson, China, Blowser, Flint, Gunlock, Tut, 
S C, Queen, with others who may not be named to ears polite, and a 
father with four sons, known as Old Frost, Young Frost, Big Frost, 
Little Frost and Red Frost. Some twenty-five years ago I saw an 
emigrant's team standing in front of William Worthington's s+ore on 
State street, and knew fi-om the style of the outfit that the proprietor 
was a pioneer. Going into the store I recognized and accosted him. 
"Sir," said I, "you resemble a man whom I knew many years ago, 

and I think you are Red Frost." " That's the man, by , who in 

Sheol are you? " 

Claim jumping was a profession among a few of the early inhab- 
itants. Others there were who "jumped" a claim for honest settle- 
ment. Among the last named class was the late William Peters. 
With old Rob and Tanner I conveyed him and a load of lumber, in 
the fall of 1837, to the claim he "jumped" in Guilford, and which 
his executors sold recently at some eighty or more dollars per acre. 

"China " Parker was one of the professionals, and a fighter from 
away back on the Picktonick(that''s one way it was spelled)bofctoms. 
At one time he was bound over to court, and as he could not furnish 
bail, there being no jail here, Haight, the sherilT, with "Old Hayes" 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 41 

and "Queen'' as guards, took him to Galena and placed him in the 
lockup there. "China" made his appearance in town at 10 o'clock 
the evening- previous to the arrival home of his guards. For explan- 
ation, he told us he was sitting at an upper window in the evening, 
and dropping asleep fell out, landing upon a cook stove, which he 
smashed to flinters. There being no ladder at hand by which tore- 
turn to the cell, and having no money to pay the damages, he con- 
cluded to "git," and he did. There were electrical disturbances in 
1837, which as a boy attracted my attention. I allude to the magnifi- 
cent thunder storms and vivid lightning. These storms were re- 
marked upon at the time by others, and I think they have not since 
been equaled. My recollection has recently been confirmed by Giles 
C. Hard, of Guilford, Parson K. -Johnson, of Mankato, Minn, and 
William Cunningham, of California. 

A most conspicuous feature upon the prairie disappeared long ago. 
I have reference to the rings of dark, weedy vegetation about two 
feet high, and from ten to one hundred feet in*diameter. These rings 
were plainly visible half a mile away and had nothing in common with 
the buffalo wallow of the western plains. The dai-k vegetation of the 
larger ones was from four to ten feet wide, with the inside of prairie 
grass, the earth as level as a floor, and the ring as true as though 
made with a compass. I never heard an explanation of the phenomenon 
except that lightning had struck there, until since I commenced to 
write these "Reminiscences," when "Lish"Kirk an old-timer who 
preceded me declared "the buffalo made 'em." (?) They were most 
common where the sod was underlaid by gravel, and on high, dry 
prairie, without method as to position, and universal throughout 
northern Illinois. There was a large buffalo wallow near the north- 
east corner of Second and Market sti"eets,and a smaller one near the 
corner northeast from St. James church when I arrived. 

Christian Frederic Charley ("old Charley") was the first professional 
butcher to locate in Rockford. He was put ashore from a keel boat 
early in June, 1838, together with all the movable paraphernalia of 
his craft,containd in an immense ironbound chest. This boat was from 
the head waters of the Pekatonika (that's the way it was spelled in 
the "Rockford Star" in 1841,) bound for St. Louis, and loaded with 
lead and petries. The craft made one or more following trips the 
same year. Old Charley was a German and to the best of my recolle- 
ction the first of that nationality to locate in Rockford. He was thor- 
oughly versed in the mysteries of compounding bologna sausage,liver- 
worts and the various strange edibles which his fellow countrymen 
have since made so popular. He built a slaughter house on the bank 



42 EARLY DAYS IN KOCKFORD. 

of the I'iver on lot 3, block A, opposite the water works, set up his 
block in the basement of the Rockforcl house, and commenced business 
the same year. 

Old Charley's slaughter house brings to mind while I write, a 
reminiscence of other parties who catered to the wants of the growing 
town and who in after years proved successful fishermen. The event 
and the fishing came oflf early in 1838 soon after the ice had gone out. 
There was a small bayou some twenty rods above State street in which 
the ice still remained. Goodyear A. Sanford and the late John Piatt, 
had a seine which they operated for the benefit of the parties directly 
interested. They came over from the west side one morning, pushed 
the ice out from this bayou and about ten o'clock had the stream and 
bank clear for the first haul. By this time a number of the east siders 
had congregated on the bank, among them D. S. Haight, who, before 
it was made, bought the proceeds of the haul for five dollars, cash in 
advance. The reader will note, that even then, one of the parties 
transacted business in f)anking style. The haul was made, and sixty 
four black bass of magnificent proportions secured. Before the seine 
was ready for the next haul the assembly had increased in numbers, 
my father being among them and the market was bullish in the bid- 
ding for the next haul. After much chaft'ei'ing my father secured it 
for seven fifty, spot cash before the boat pushed out. They got forty- 
two bass this time, like unto the first lot. The reason I remember so 
distinctly, is that Haight and my father pooled issues, and under his 
directions I dressed and salted the fish. By this time the market was 
excited, prices tended skyward, and ''Gunlock'' (Tom Miller,) bid 
ten dollars, stipulating the haul be made strictly as he should dictate. 
The result was a water haul, when Messrs. Sanford and Piatt put the 
seine aboard the boat and returned to the west side. 

Some twenty years ago I stated, and it was so published at the 
time in one of the local papers, that the first session of the circuit 
court, the Hon. Dan Stone presiding, was held in the Rockford House. 
A recent examination of the docket has convinced me I was mistaken. 
The first session of the court was held October 6, 1837, at the house of 
Daniel S. Haight, as the law provided and the docket states. The 
petit jurors in attendance were : Edwar(^ Gating, James B. Martyn, 
Joel Pike, Williiim Pepper, Richard Montague, Isaac N. Cunning- 
ham, Thatcher Blake, Henry Thurston, Charles I. Horsman, David 
Goodrich, James Jackson and Cyrus C. Jenks. The judge appointed 
Seth B. Farwell prosecuting attorney pw tern. Through an oversight 
I omitted to^copy the names of the grand jurors. It was the second 
session, 31st of May, 1838, I saw, which was quite largely attended 
and had both grand and petit juries. As I had never seen a court in 
session where a judge presided, I most distinctly remember my sur- 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 43 

prise to find the judge, the Hon. Dan Stone, occupying one of the few- 
chairs we had in the house, wliile it was the jury who "sat upon the 
bench." 

Tlie first building erected for the use of courts, religious meetings, 
etc., was built by Daniel S. Haight in the summer of 1838, on the 
southeast corner of Market and Madison streets. Some of the law- 
yers who attended the early courts, in after years ranked among the 
most able men in the profession. I recall Judge Drummond and 
Thompson Campbell, of Galena; a Mr .Joel Wells, who stumped the 
district for congress, N. B. Judd, of Chicago, and Seth B. Farwell 
and Martin P. Sweet, of Freeport. Of Thompson Campbell I am im- 
pelled to make more than a passing mention. As an orator, he was, 
by his friends, considered to be without a peer in the nation, even the 
fame of "the mill boy of the Slashes'' paled in his presence. Sweet and 
Far well were remarkably successful in their pleas before a jury, and 
for unique methods, humor and invective, Seth Farwell had no rival, 
Campbell and B"'arwell were sent to California by the government as 
commissioners to try the land titles which came up in relation to the 
Mexican land grants, and both died in that state. 

The late Hon. John Wentworth made his maiden speech in Rock- 
ford, having volunteered his services as attorney in a case that prom- 
ised to be game. Long John was as well known in this county as in 
his own district, possibly better, and he always came to Rockford 
while attending to the congressional fence repairing, a duty which he 
accomplished in the most thorough manner. The last time he ran 
for congress the convention was held at Dixon, and he came to Rock- 
ford with three four horse coaches loaded with his friends. In order 
that he might have altitude in which to stretch himself, he sat on the 
middle seat next the door with his head out of the window. As they 
were leaving town, Charley Tyler hailed him with, "Hello, .John, 
where you're goin T' . To congress, by ,"' and he did. 

In May last, I wrote the Hon. R. R. Hitt at Washington for cer- 
tain information from the Post Office Department, and a few days 
after, and before his reply could have been received, sent a second 
epistle to the ett'ect that the task I had undertaken was greater and 
more difficult than I had anticipated. That neither my education, 
habits, or avocations in life had fitted me for an author. That I felt 
confident the statements I should make would in future years be ac- 
cepted as authority, and taking a broad view of the situation, and 
also that the task was at best a thankless one, I was disposed to throw 
it up then and there. To this Mr. Hitt replied as per his letter of 
May 19th (here inserted), which together with encouragement from 
various old timers have induced me to proceed. 



44 early days in rockford. 

House of Representatives, U. S. ) 
Washington, D. C, Mslj 19, 1890. f 

John H. Thurston, Esq., 209 South Madison St., Rockford, 111. 

Dear *S'«'.-— I have read your second lettei' of the 16th, with in- 
creasing interest, and trust you will not forget your promise to send 
me a copy when you print, for I have had a kindred feeling and expe- 
rience. In that same year, 1837, on the 15th of September, I came, a 
little child, with our family, to Ogle county, and remember the inci- 
dents of the life during the " forties " with the photographic fidelity 
with which all events connected with our youth are impressed upon 
the memory. And there was, in fact, much more of individuality in 
the life of each one then, of freshness and hope and originality in the 
life of the community than in the uniformity that prevades today. 
With the growth of a great population, the events of each individ- 
ual's life are dwarfed into pettiness and monotony. The insecurity 
of the eai'lier time gave a flavor of something akin to danger. The 
rapid changes in men's condition coming from an older and fixed com- 
munity into the new and wilder region of the Rock River Valley were 
replete with many stirring incidents worthy of record. But in record- 
ing how things are reversed ! Nowadays three to four columns a day 
are published of local details in a town. Then .'scarcely a word was 
printed in the whole community. Only from the letters, and scanty 
enough they are, of those who are gone, and fi'om the reminiscences 
of old settlers like yourself, can we expect these souvenirs to be gath- 
ered up for permanent preservation. I hope you will not weary in 
your work. You will find as you talk with your cotemporaries of an- 
other time, memories awaken that will give you incidents that you 
had not thought of for long, and will learn others from them. 

Very truly yours, R. R. Hitt. 

Office of the Postmaster General, [ 
Washington, D. C, May 21, 1890. \ 

Hon. R. R. Hitt, House of Representatives : 

Dear Sir :—l am in receipt of your letter of the 19th inst., asking 
for certain information in reference to the postoffices of Rockford, 
Rockton, Roscoe, Byron, and Oregon, 111. ; and of the time of the ap- 
pointment of Mr. Daniel S. Haight as postmaster at Rockford. 

In reply permit me to say that the records of the department are 
quite meager as to the offices during the early history of the service. 
I am able, however, to give you the following information : 

Rockford — Daniel S. Haight was appointed postmaster August 
31, 1837, and served until June 26, 1840. 

Rockton — This office was established as Pekatonica, and Mr. 
George Stevens was appointed postnjastor December 26, 1838, and 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 45 

served until May 13, 1840. Sometime between that date and Pebru- 
aiy 26, 1846, the name of the office was changed, and on the latter 
date Charles Kane was appointed postmaster. 

ROSCOE — Was established as a special office and Mr. Ralph M. P. 
A bell was appointed postmaster July 26, 1837. He served until July 
12, 1839. 

Byron — Was established as a special office May 26, 1838, and Asa 
G. Spalding was appointed postmaster. 

Oregon — This office was then known as Oregon City. Mr. D. H. 
T. Moss was appointed postmaster May 15, 1837, and served until No- 
vember 13, 1841. 

Trusting this information may be of service to you and Mr. 
Thurston, I am, very truly, 

J. W. Wanamaker, Postmaster General. 

As noted in the letter from the postmaster general, Daniel S. 
Haight was the first postmaster, his commission running fi'om August 
31, 1837, until June 26, 1840. The first mail arrived about September 
15, 1837. Previous to this, the mail had been brought from Chicago 
bj' parties making the trip for supplies, an order upon the postmaster 
at that office for the mail being left at Haight's house, to which each 
man attached his name. The postage on letters from the east was 
twenty-five cents, and the time in transit from fifteen to thirty days. 
When the mail arrived there was no key and it went back unopened. 
At the second arrival a key had been provided, but Haight, who 
could not master the combination, turned it over to Giles C. Hard, his 
right hand man in emergencies, and who is entitled to whatever of 
honor and fame there may be in having opened the first mail in 
Kockford. 

Haight built a small building in the summer of 1837, on the site 
of No. 107 South Madison street, for a post office, which was used un- 
til the following year, when he put up quite a commodious building 
on the site of No. 312 State street, with ante-room, boxes, etc. This 
structure was used for a post office during several following adminis- 
trations. My father selected box 100 ; from him it went to Haight, 
and when he left the town in the winter of 1847-8, it was turned over 
to me, and was my box until the advent of free delivery. 

The first theatrical exhibitio i in Rockford was given October 29, 
1S38 (I get the date from an old account book), in the Rockford House, 
by the troupe of the elder Jefi'erson, the father of "Joe " Jefferson, 
since become of world wide fame as an actor, more particularly so 
from his deliveration of "Rip Van Winkle." "Joe" was about ten 
years old at the time, and sang and acted "Lord Lovel," a new bal- 
lad then. The troupe were stranded here while en-route from Chica- 
go to Galena, being unable to cross the river by heavy ice running in 



46 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

the stream. The last time he was here, " Joe '' was interviewed by a 
reporter for one of the local papers, and he related his early visit to 
Rockfoi'd correctly, except he thought it was the Washington House 
where the troupe played. 

CHAPTER V. 

First Iron Foundry— First Dentist—" Doc " Webber, the Portait Painter— Whitney, 
the Thief— Broadies and Driscolls— Nigger Baby— "Duke " Wellington— Robbery 
of McKenney's Store as related by " Brad "—Brad's Full Dress Suit— He Makes 
Morning Calls— Robbery of William Mulford— Set There, You D- — -d Curly- 
Headed Irishman— Robbers and Pirates— Chain the Old Devil. 

The first iron foundry was started, as near as can be ascertained, 
in 1841-2, by Peter H. Watson, but proved an abortive attempt o wing- 
to the charcoal fuel. The blast was produced by horse power. This 
Mr. Watson was at one time Assistant Secretary of War during the 
late unpleasantness, and at a later period President of the New York 
& Erie Railway. The foundry was located at about the centre of the 
east half of block 18, next south of the public square. 

Since this paragraph was written Mr. Harvey H. Silsby, now re- 
siding at La Cygne, Linn county, Kansas, who came here from 
Acworth, New Hampshire, early in May. 1838, supplies me with items 
from which I compile a brief history of this pioneer foundry. 

The original proprietors were Chandler & Watson, succeeded by 
Reynolds & Lyon ; Lyon & Chamberlin ; John Steves •, Harvey H. 
Silsby ; Loami Peake in 1850, and by him sold to James L. Fountain, 
who removed the apparatus to New Milford. Mr. Silsby thinks the 
foundry first started in 1842-3, and commenced to melt iron in what 
may be termed a pocket furnace, which was nothing more than a 
common blacksmith's forge, in which they melted about 100 lbs. at 
one heat, and which they sometimes charged five or six times a day. 
They afterwards put up a cupola furnace. This pocket furnace agrees 
with my recollection of the fixture. I was present at the first heat, 
as I distinctly remember the fuel was charcoal and the apparatus 
open on top. The largest portion of this first charge was not melted 
sufficiently to be made available. The bellows was after a plan of a 
steam engine ; a piston, with a cylinder three feet in diameter and 
about the same length, with a receiver above, on which were weights 
to force a regular blast ; the machine being worked by horse power. 
It appears that in 1844 they had got well started, as they were then 
building threshing machines and horse-powers with which to drive 
them. These machines were a failure, as they cut the grain. 

During Mr. Silby's administration, (1847-8 to 1850) Lehigh coal, 
brought from Chicago, cost about $1(5.00 per ton; pig iron, $30.00 per 
ton. Patterns were furnished and castings sold for five cents per 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. ■ 47 

pound for ordinary work, while light castings brought seven to ten 
cents. The business was fairly profitable for the time under Mr. 
Silsby's supervision, as when he sold out in 1850 it realized about one 
thousand dollars per year. 

As an instance of how slight an incident may sometimes change 
the direction of the energies of a man's life in the struggle for exist- 
ence, and particularly as illustrative of a marked characteristic in 
the temperment of all pioneers ; their desire for change and the ease 
and quickness with which they accomplished it, Mr. Silsby tells me, 
that at a week's notice in the spring of 1850, he had sold out this 
foundry and was off across the plains for California. 

I think Jonathan T. Miller was the first dentist in the town who 
would be recognized by the profession, and his advent was about 1843, 
although he was here in 1841, and applied for a situation as teacher 
in the brick school house on the southeast corner of the public square. 
As some sort of a school fight was going on at the time, he withdrew 
his application and returned to New York state. There was, however, 
a tooth carpenter here in the fall of 1837, who had a rough experi- 
ence. He whitened the boys' teeth and set false incisors, which he 
fastened to the old stump with a metal -pin. I was watching his 
operations while he worked upon " Ike " Forshay, and when he struck 
the incisor a smart blow driving it into the old stump, "• Ike " hauled 
off and knocked him over. 

Ebenezer S. ("Doc '') Webber, who came here from Niles, Michi- 
gan, in 1840, was the first portrait painter. His studio occupied the 
second floor of the brick part of the building now standing at No. 114 
North Madison street. He delineated most of the boys about town on 
the east side, among them myself ; the charge in my case being fif- 
teen dollars, for which I had to hustle "right smart," and paid in 
installments of five dollars each. 

Thieves, gamblers, and desperate characters were traversing the 
country, and Rockford appears to have been a conspicuous crossing 
point with the fraternity. I recall one fellow by the name of Whit- 
ney ranging from the Illinois river to Mineral Point, who made 
no pretense of being anything but a thief. An old timer relates an 
incident in Whitney's career which came off in the Rockford House. 
At breakfast, my father sat at the head of the table with Whitney 
upon one side and near him. Whitney asked if he intended the re- 
mark he had just made to apply to him ? To this my father replied, 
"if the coat fits you may wear it." Whitney drew his pistol, leveled 
it, and at the same instant, two men sitting on the opposite side of the 
table drew pistols and covered Whitney, when he concluded the odds 
were against him and put up his weapon. 

The Broadies and DriscoUs, two families of thieves from Ogle 



48 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

county, were frequent visitors in the town, and usually brought with 
them a famous quarter horse called "Nig-ger Baby," offering to 
bet fabulous (at that time) sums, "the Nigger could beat any horse, 
mare, or gelding in the town," and he usually did if matched. The 
fame of the "Nigger" had extended in the fall of 1838 to central 
Indiana, and a horse was brought from that locality to get a race with 
him. A match was finally arranged at 600 yards, in which the " Nig- 
ger " gave his opponent fifty feet at the outcome. The contest came 
off on the Kishwaukee road half a Jiile south of the town, and the 
crowd exceeded all previous gathei ings in the county. To the sur- 
prise of most of them, the "Nigger' was easily defeated. 

From 1838 to '48 inclusive, Rockiord was a regular stopping place 
for the Mississippi river card sharps, when they crossed the country 
from or to Chicago. They carried a perfect paraphernalia of gamb- 
ling implements, roulette, faro layovTt, etc., in innocent looking trav- 
eling trunks. I recall one of the fraternity known as " Duke " Well- 
ington, who in the winter of 1846-7 won $700 from Martin O. Walker, 
of the stage firm of Frink & Walker. 

I am indebted to Bradford McKenney, now residing in Ogle 
county, near Daysville, for the following graphic account of the rob- 
bery of his brother William's grocery store in September, 1843. The 
building occupied the site of No. 318 East State street. The narra- 
tive is in " Brad's " own unique style, and Avill readily be recognized 
by all his old friends and acquaintances of " ye olden time." It is the 
first and only account of the details of the event which has ever been 
published. 

While clerking for my brother William in his store at Rockford 
on the east side during the summer of 1843, I slept on the counter 
right over the money drawer. The money was kept in two trunks 
under the counter upon which I slept. One was a large strong trunk, 
and in that all the money that was not to be used for making change 
was put. On top of this one was a small one in which money needed 
for maKing change was put. No safe in Rockford at that time. 

In the lower trunk, early in September, had accumulated about 
twelve hundred dollars, and as my brother had intended to go to New 
York the latter part of August, but had been delayed, he had made 
no effort to get exchange on New York. On the night of September 
15th, about half past three, I was awakened by a noise under the 
counter where the trunks were, and the next instant something hit 
my feet and I raised up to find out what it was. The rain was pour- 
ing down in torrents ; it was thundering fearfully, and a flash of light- 
ning about evei'y minute. I put my hand onto a trunk handle. Just 
then came a flash of lighting and I saw a man I took to be "Tut" 
Baker — I think his name was John— who I was well acquainted with, 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 49 

and says I, " what in are you doing- here ?" and says he, " keep 

still, Brad, it's all right." The moment I heard his voice I knew it 
was not "■ Tut " Baker, for I had known him ever since I had been in 
Rockford. '■ Bill sent me here to take these trunks and hide them, 
and then he can say he has been robbed, and can settle with his New 
York creditors and make a big thing out of it." '' But," says I, " who 

the are you, anyhowV" '"Oh!" says he, "it's all right. Bill 

understands it ; you just keep still and it will be all right." "• No," 
says I, "that won't go down. Bill don't owe anything in New York, 

and besides that I am sure that if there had been anything 

of that kind going on I should have heard of it before this time." 
"Now, Brad, I tell you Bill and I understand it and its all right." 
"Well " says I, "you can't have the trunk anyhow." Just then he 
gave the trunk a jerk, but I had got both hands hold of it and it didn't 
move easily. " Now look here" says he, "if you want to live, you 
just keep still and let go of that trunk ; I ain't going to run all this 
risk for nothing. " Just feel of that" said he, and I felt something 
touch me on my breast, and a flash of lightning showed me a bowie- 
knife about a foot long lying slanting across my breast. I shoved the 
knife away with my right hand. "Take care" said he, " or you'll 

cut your fingers." " Now I want the key quick." The key 

was in my pants at the foot of the bed on the counter, and the trunk 
was on top of them. I thought I would not let him get the key quite so 
easy. "If you get the key" I said, "you'll have to find Bill." 
"Well then" said he, "I'll take the trunk." "No you won't" I 
said, and I slid off the counter and gave the trunk a jerk and tried to 
pull it off the counter, but I could not do it, for he had hold of the 
other end, and was still behind the counter where he had found the 
trunks. The next I saw of him, he was on the counter with his right 
hand around the trunk and his bowie knife in his left hand. I could 
see him plainly every time it lightened and that was every few sec- 
onds. "Now look here" said he, "By , if you don't let go of 

that trunk in less than a minute, I will cut your hand loose from it." 
and his bowie-knife was not a great ways above my hand either. 

I thought about the best thing I could do, was to let go, and I did. 
1 went to the front door, the key was in the lock on the inside. I un- 
locked it, took out the key and put it in the lock on the outside and lock- 
ed the door. I shall never forget the cold bath I took the moment I 
stepped outside, for the rain was coming down not in torrents, but in 
great sheets and I had nothing on but my shirt. Just as I got the 
door locked, the stage was coming up that little rise of ground nearly 
opposite the store, with the horses on the gallop. I ran out in the 
road and made frantic appeals to the driver to stop the stage and 
7 



50 EARLY DAYS IN KOCKFORD. 

have the passengers help me. The horses kind of slacked up a little 
and I thought he was a going to stop, and I began yelling robbers and 
help ! He put the whip on the horses and on he went, and on I went 
for the Rockford House. I don't think I ever made such time before 
or since. I got there ahead of the stage. There was a dim light in 
the bar-room, but no one there. The moment I got inside, I yelled 
help and robbers ! and kept yelling as I made my way to my brother's 
room, which had always been at the head of the stairs ; but when I 
began pounding on the door and calling him, the yell that came 
from that room could be heard farther than mine. It was a woman's! I 

Then I came to a dead halt, but the next instant a flash of light- 
ning showed me the chamber door and I opened that and yelled 
" Where is Bill McKenney's room ?'' As I had to repeat it several 
times, I began to think they were all dead ; but finally Old Capin an- 
swered, "down stairs in the bed-room ofT from the parlor with 
Church,'' (Judge Selden M. Church.) He had changed his room a 
day or two before and had forgotten to tell me ; so I made for the 
stairs and just as I struck them. Old Capin shouted " what in sheol 
has broke loose V but I did not have a chance to answer, for in my 
hurry to get down, I stumbled and fell to the bottom, gathered myself 
up and made my way to my brother's room. 

If electric lights had been in full operation them days, I probably 
should have offered an apology to the lady that was just going into 
the bar-room as I landed at the bottom of the stairs, for my lack of a 
full dress suit, but I didn't, I hadn't time, and did my level best to 
wake him up suddenly. I think the .ludge will remember that call, 
and as soon as I had made him understand what had happened, he told 
where to go for help, and among the first he told mo to call on, was 
Bill McDole and Charley Oliver. I made a number of calls on First 
street, but I did not go in, for I was not suitably dressed for making 
morning calls. When I got back to the store, there was fifteen or 
twenty men on the sidewalk and among them was Bill McDole and 
Charley Oliver. It was still raining, and some of the men had um- 
brellas and several had lanterns, but by the time I got dressed it had 
nearly stopped and it was getting daylight. 

We found he had cut away the putty from around a pane of glass; 
turned the window fastening, raised the window and put a stick under 
it to hold it up. The back door was unbolted and stood wide open. 
Some of the men had started out with lanterns and as soon as it was 
light enough to see, the men started out in every direction. The trunk 
was soon found down in the brush west of old Bill Hamilton's house, 
which stood on the lot now occupied by John Spafford's warehouse 
(northwest corner Madison and Market streets.) It was brought to 
the store and there was eight dollars in silver in it. They wei-e so 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 51 

close after him he did not have time to get it all out. During the day 
several dollars were found between where Peacock's brewery now 
stands and Henry Ellis' house, and in old Boswell's buckwheat field, 
two sovereigns and five or six dollars in silver. They tracked him by 
the money he lost nearly to the road running up the river, there they 
lost track of him. 

The next spring, James Gilbert found sixty-two dollars only a few 
rods from where the trunk was found. It had apparently been stamped 
into the ground. I was not a little astonished when he came in with 
it in his hat and dumped it down on the counter, and told me to count 
it; for says he, " I think it belongs to Bill," and that was the general 
conclusion, so my brother kept it, and it was all he ever got back. 

Why I mention McDole and Oliver, is that at the time of the rob- 
bery, my brother considered them among his best friends, and in the 
Mulford trial it came out that they got up the sight and sent for an- 
other man to do the job, and that Bill McDole was at the back door 
while the fellow was in the store. 

My brother had such confidence in them both as friends, that he 
wonld not believe they had anything to do with robbing him until he 
heard the testimony, and at the close of the trial, Bill McDole asked 
my father and brother both, to sign a bail bond right in the coui-t 
house, but they told him the evidence was a little too strong. 

Some have written accounts of that robbery in which they say I 
used a revolver, but I had no revolver, and up to that time had never 
seen a pistol, and I don't think the idea of being robbed ever came 
into my brother's head ; I know it did not into mine. He never so 
much as mentioned it to me. There were no blinds on the front or 
back windows; only a paper curtain, and half the time I did not pull 
them down. Bradford McKenney. 

Saturday evening, November 9, 1844, William Mulford, residing 
on his farm in Guilford, four and one-half miles east on the Cherry 
Valley road, was robbed of five hundred dollars in money. He came 
to Rockford early the next morning, the writer meeting him on the 
steps of the Washington House, and was the first person to whom he 
mentioned the fact. I aroused Haight, Grant B. Udell a lawyer, 
James Mitchell clerk of the Circuit Court, with several others whose 
names I do not now recall, and we all went into Udell's office where 
Mr. Mulford related the events of the previous evening. Mr. James 
Mitchell was a large tall man, and while telling the story, Mr. Mul- 
ford believed at the time, as he afterwards told me, that Mitchell was 
the man who held his (Mulford's) own rifle, with the muzzle pressed 
against his back, as he forced him to precede him about the cabin 
while searching the premises, and he said he knew it would explode 
when the trigger was pulled. By this the reader may get some in- 



52 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

sight of the condition of society in a part of the " early days in Rock- 
ford," when an innocent man and estimable citizen as Mr. Mitchell 
was, may be temporarilly suspected of consorting with robbers, merely 
from his personal appearance. Mr. Mitchell went from Rockford to 
Freeport, where he resided until his death, about ten years ago. 

From my personal knowledge of Mr. Mulford's character and 
bodily vigor, I have no hesitation in pronouncing him a game man, 
and if he could have secured his rifle, one at least of the robbers, would 
have been killed. 

The following interesting details of what transpired that evening 
in the cabin, are supplied by his son Edward Mulford, who remarked 
when he handed me the notes from which I gather the account of the 
fracas, " I was there, but not much help, as I was six months old at 
the time." 

In the fall of 1844, a well dressed man called at the house of 
William Mulford in the township of Guilford, four and one-half miles 
east of Rockford, and asked for employment, introducing himself as 
Mr. Haines. He staid but a few moments, and said as he departed 
that he would call again in a few days. Shortly after this one evening 
about nine o^clock, three masked men armed with pistots, knives and 
hickory clubs, came to the door of Mr. Mulford's house and knocked 
for admittance. John Carman, who was working for Mr. Mulford at 
the time, opened the door. As soon as the door was opened, one of 
the men grabbed Carman by the throat, backed him into the house 
and forced him down onto a vinegar barrel that was in the room, say- 
ing to him "set there, you d — d curly-headed Irishman." Mr. Mul- 
ford was in the room, and hearing some noise and scuffling, thought 
it was made by some of the neighboring boys, had paid no attention 
to it until he heard the order to Carman to sit down ; that attracting 
his attention he looked around, and as he did so, asked "what is the 
x-acket here ?" At this query, one of the gang stepped up to him and 
introduced himself and companions in the following words : "We are. 
robbers and pirates from the upper seas. We are after your money, 

and by we will have it, and the best thing you can do is to let us 

have the money and be quiet ; if you do not, we shall search for it." 

Mr. Mulford told them he " had but little money, and none for 
them." The leader then ordered Mulford to be seated and they would 
commence the search. He stationed one of his men at the inside door 
armed with two pistols, several knives and a hickory club. Taking 
the candle from the table he cut it into three pieces, lighted them, 
placing one in each of the two windows, retaining the third piece for 
his own use in the search. They commenced at the bureau, taking 
every article out of the drawers, unfolding and carefully shaking them 
in order to discover any hidden treasure. Mrs. Mulford, who with 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 58 

ber two children was lying on the bed, seeing them scatter and tram- 
ple her clothing under foot, told them there was no money there, and 
having recognized the leader said to him, "'Mr. Haines, you conduct 
yourself very differently from what you did the day you came to ob- 
tain employment/' She had recognized him notwithstanding his 
disguise. Upon hearing this the robber drew a large knife from his 

belt and rushing to the bedside, said "Shut your clack, or I will 

leave a stain on the floor that will remain for ages/" He then turned 
to his comrades and said, " Boys, I am known ; I must make tracks." 
After they had looked over everything in the bureau they went up- 
stairs. The first thing they came in contact with there, was a trunk 
belonging to John Saylor who worked for Mr. Mulford, but happened 
to be away that night. They took everything of value in the trunk 
and searched every nook and corner ; finding nothing more worth 
taking, they came down and went into the cellar. The cellar was not 
stoned up, and rats had made several holes in the walls of earth. 
These holes they dug into with their knives to see if gold had been 
secreted there. They also cut open some pumpkins and turnips 
lying there, thinking gold might be concealed in the vegetables. 
There were a number of cakes of tallow in the cellar which they cut 
to pieces, saying "they had known women cunning enough to run tal- 
low around gold. 

Finding nothing of value in the cellar they returned to the 
place where they commenced, and talked over the disappointment. 
While they were conversing, one of them discovered three small 
drawers at the top of the bureau which they had over looked in 
their first search, and asked for the keys. Mr. Mulford told 
them the last recollection he had of them, they were in the stable be- 
hind the horses. They said they did not like to take the top off the 
bureau and would go and get them, so two of them went to the stable 
for the keys. Mr. Mulford thought that by getting some of the party 
out of the house, he might succeed by moving carefully about in secur- 
ing his rifle that was hanging under some clothing at one end of the 
room. After the men who had gone for the keys had left the house 
he got up and walked the floor, finally halting in front of the weapon 
and had just got his hand on the arm, when he heard a slight noise 
and looking over his shoulder saw the man who had been stationed at 
the door, standing behind him holding a pistol close to his head. This 
man then took the rifle and a shot gun that was hanging there and 
every moment after that while they remained in the house, held the 
rifle aimed at Mr. Mulford 's head, so that if he attempted to get pos- 
session of any other weapon he would be prepared for him. The men 
could not find the keys in the stable and returned to the house very 
angry, and making manj' thi'eats, swearing they would "chain the 



54 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

old devil, set the house on fire, and by the time he got well scorched 
he would tell where the keys were/' As they said this, one of them 
ran his hand into his pocket, and Mrs. Mulford thought she heard 
something rattle like a chain : she then told them where the keys 
were. They soon unlocked the drawers and in one of them found five 
hundred dollars. It was in an enveloj^e just as it was taken from the 
bank. The man Haines (Robert Burke) took it to the table and 
counted it, saying *•' three hundred and fifty dollars — this is worse 
than a wolf hunt." When Haines said "'three hundred and fifty dol- 
lars," Mr. Mulford spoke up and said, "I do not wish to have you 
cheat your comrades, thei-e is five hundred dollars in that package, 
and I should like to have you leave enough of it to pay my hired men 
who are poor." They said they intended to divide with him, but did 
not do so. They talked together for a few moments and then left the 
place. 

Before leaving they asked Mr. Mulford what he intended to do ? 
Cautioned him not to try and catch them as they were strong in num- 
bers, and warned him several times not to go out of his house before 
daylight, as they would leave men stationed at the door, and if any 
living thing made its appeai-ance outside of the door before daylight, 
it would be a corpse. They then a bade him good night, going out of 
the house baclcwards, with their guns and pistols pointed at Mr. Mul- 
ford as long as they could see him. It was ascertained afterwards, 
that two men were outside armed with rifles, and that was the reason 
why candles were placed at the windows. 



CHAPTER VI. 



First Tinner— Leach & Penlield— A Varied Assortment of Hardware— Willard 
Wheeler— A Deacons Decision on Shoemaker Loo and Division Loo— Doc. Searles 
He Builds the First Soda Fountain and A Rotary Steam Engine— Judge Black- 
stone's Experience with this Engine— Laomi Peake Sen - Makes the First Har- 
ness—Value of Real Estate in 1839— Been Whipped a Thousand Times- First 
Brick Store on the East Side— First Cabinet Maker— An Early Subscription Pa- 
per—First Doctnr— Old Froth— I've Killed More than Forty -First Grist Mill- 
First Saloon— Tobacco Famine— Julius P. Bolivar MacCabe— First Religious 
Services— First Quarterly Meeting— First Camp Meeting— First Religious Soci- 
ety—Thousand Legs and His Jack. 

I have been unable to ascertain the name of the first tinner in 
Rockford, but I do recollect that he was here in the early fall of 1838, 
and in the employ of Leach & Penlield (Shepherd Leach and David S. 
Penfield. Mr. Penfield was a native of Pittsfield, Vt.), whose store 
occupied the site of No. 322 east State street, and was erected by 
Tinker & Johnson. I recall his presence in the town at that early 
day, from an incident personal to myself. In the fall of 1838 a stove 
was required to be set up in the dining room of the Rockford House, 
and as my father was confined to his bed in the adjoining room by 
rheumatism, I was detailed for the job. The pipe was irregular in 
size, and required some thirty feet in length to reach the chimney. 
The old gentleman was irritable and lay on his couch blowing me up 
for my inability to perform the task. I too, was "blowing ^ in sub- 
duced tones. (but none the less emphatic on that account,) the whole 
outfit. Finally the services of this tinner were secured, and the ma- 
jority of mankind will agree in the conviction, that the man who un- 
der like conditions, can place thirty feet of horizontal stove pipe in 
position without swearing, is indeed an artist in his line. 

Mrs. D. S. Penfield informs me, the stock of Leach & Penfield 
would invoice about three thousand dollars, and contained a general 
assortment of merchandise ; iron, tin, and woodenware, groceries, 
dry goods, millinery and fancy goods, etc. 

"Willard Wheeler, who came here from St. Thomas, Upper Can- 
ada, in September 1839, was the second tinner in the town, and as he 
continued the business for sevei-al years afterwards, it has generally 



.5fi EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

been supposed he was the first in that line. His peculiarities will be 
remembered by all his friends and associates. His thorough and 
practical knowledge of the games and pastimes then in vogue, may 
not have been suspected by his brethren in the church. In the early 
forties, a dispute occurred at a gambling table and the decision was 
left to " Doc '' Searles. The legality of his ruling was disputed, and 
it was finally agreed that the question be submitted to Willard Wheel- 
er, whose decision should be final, and that ''Doc" himself should 
state the matter in dispute. Willard (who at one time was, and could 
then have been a bad man in a row,) decided that in shoemaker loo 
and division loo, the *•' Doc " had decided correctly, by both law and 
precedent. 

Any account of ''Early Days in Rockford," and the prominent 
characters in the town at the time, would most certainly be incomplete, 
should it fail to mention Hosea D. ("Doc ") Searles, who came here 
from his native state of Connecticut in the early summer of 1841, and 
who almost immediately acquired the sobriquet of '" Dogbutton," the 
seed of a vegetable from which strychnine is extracted, with one of 
which he attempted to "ante'' at a game of brag. This title was 
however, soon dropped, and subsequently he was universally known 
as " Doc " from his profession as a druggist. He was the founder (I 
think in 1842) of the drug business now carried on by the sons of the 
late William Worthington at No. 422 east State street, the firm being 
Searles & Worthington. He possessed a fund of dry humor that was 
unique in its character, and which to the gratification of " the boys,'' 
was frequently brought into requisition during the long evenings in 
winter, the "Doc"' relating some humorous incident which had re- 
cently transpired, and wherein one of "the boys " then present was a 
factor, his own face as calm as a summer morning, while the audience 
was convulsed with laughter. 

He possessed mechanical skill of a high order. He built and put 
in operation the first soda fountain in Rockford, the design of the 
machine being his own — it was built of wood — and he constructed and 
put it together in person. I am unable to describe the apparatus, 
except that it had a wooden lever about ten feet long, and squirted 
like a fire engine while filling the glasses, the said "glasses," as a 
rule, having had "a stick in 'em " before being filled with soda water. 
He built a rotary steam engine, which he sold to the Mt. Morris Sem- 
inary. This machine was also his own design and construction, with 
the f^xception of the boiler, which was of copper and supplied by 
Williard Wheeler. 

This engine was the cause of a ludicrous incident that will be fully 
appreciated by those still hei'e who knew ".Judge " BlacKstone. The 
machine set in a fi-ame the width of a counter and about three feet 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 57 

long; when in operation it was placed in the»center of the store on the 
counter that we might get a better view. The steam escaped through 
the spokes of a wheel some twelve inches in diameter and when in 
operation, was slightly enveloped in vapor. The boiler was filled with 
water, the fire stai'ted and the engine ran while the supply lasted, 
there being no pump to the apparatus. The first time it was started 
for exhibition to the general public was in the drug store, and tlie 
room was crowded, the " Judge " being in the front rank, as he always 
tried to be for that matter. There was a high pressure of steam and 
a small chip in the water had been forced into the safety valve of the 
boiler. The steam instantly escaped with an unearthlj' scream like 
unto a whistle, which none of us had ever heard before. We all bolted 
for the door except the " Doc,'' whose attainments told him the thing 
wM,sn't going to ''bust" under the conditions. Among the first to 
leave was the ''Judge ;'' in the fracas he was knocked down and the 
crowd behind went over his prostrate body, myself being among 
the first to tread on him. The volume of oaths, imprecations and in- 
vectives that came from the '• Judge '" while he was on the Hoor, was 
unprecedented even in his career and he was the most original char- 
acter in that line in the state. When the " Judge "' finally got upon 
his feet, the room was clear, the machine was running smoothly and 
the " Doc " in his most suave tone and manner inquired, "Judge, 
what is the matter ?"" 

" Matter enough, by . A small man has no chance at all in 

this crowd.'" 

In the summer of 1851, the " Doc" Andrew Brown and myself 
made a trip to Chicago. In the center of Garden Prairie, standing in 
a cornfield, we saw- the "Pioneer," the first locomotive in use by the 
Galena and Chicago Union Rail Road. " Andrew," said " Doc," "do 
you see that hossV Let's go and look at her. " While examining the 
machine, "Doc" remarked to me, "John, I can make a machine 
like that," and he did. This machine ran on a circular track three 
feet in diameter, the propelling force being a spirit lamp. When 
once started there was no way of stopping it while the lamp burned 
and the water lasted, and it whizzed around the track after the fash- 
ion that Mark Beaubein kept tavern. His only failure in a mechani- 
cal way of which I have any knowledge, was an attempt to manufac- 
ture a Chinese gong. I went with him one cold day in winter to N. 
B. Gaston's scale works in Beloit, where he melted his compound of 
metals in a crucible. The casting was a failure, and he remarked to 
me, "John, the mould must be hot." 

I am indebted to Mr. and Mrs. Laomi Peake Senior for the fol- 
lowing account of tlu- first hai-ness maker in Rockford. Mr. Peake. 
8 



58 EARLY 'DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

who is a native of Salisbury, Herkimer county, New York, emigrated 
from St. Thomas, Upper Canada, to Rockford, in September, 1839, 
being one of the few among tlie early arrivals who possessed capital, 
having about hve thousand dollars in money. His family arrived 
April lo, 1840. There was a harness maker here before ho arrived, 
so Mr. Peake informs me, who did not remain long, and who made re- 
pairs only. Of this man I have no recollection, neither have I found 
a person who does remember him. As Mr. Peake was the first per- 
son who made a harness here, and carried on the business for many 
years subsequently, he may claim to have been the first in that line. 

Mr. Peake bought the lot on the northeast corner of First and 
State streets, 66 feet on First street by 156 feet on State street for one 
hundred dollars, and put up a brick building 22 by 35 feet, with two 
stories and basement, at a cost of fifteen hundred dollars, immediately 
after his arrival. The corner of this lot is now occupied by the Man- 
ufacturers' Nat. Bank. In the summer of 1852, he completed the 
brick block now standing on the corner of this lot at a cost of about 
*7,000, with an additional expense of $1,000, in fitting up the hall 
which occupied the whole of the third floor. The same year of his 
arrival he purchased for a farm, a tract of one hundred and thirty 
acres on State street, for which he paid* $750. The southwest corner 
of this land was at or near Summit street, extending east to Prospect 
street on East State street. Peake's block (corner State and First 
streets) was burned November 27th, 1857, the side and rear walls re- 
maining. The corner store at the time of the fire was occupied by 
Huntington \' Barnes (C. A. Huntington and Robert Barnes) for a 
book store, at a rental of $450 per year for the room, with $80 addi- 
tional for a r(j()m on the second flooi' in which they operated a ruling 
machine. Kirk & Haines, the present owners, purchased the proper- 
ty in the fall of 1858 for $4,000, and rebuilt the block the following 
year. I have given these particulars in order that a knowledge of 
the value of landed property at the time may be recorded. 

The beauty of the landscape looking south from the top of the hill 
on east State street, before it was disfigured by improvements, was as 
well known and appreciated in the forties as it has ever been since. 
".Judge" Blackstone used to relate an anecdote of one of the team- 
sters, who with six horses freighted merchandise from Galena to Chi- 
cago. One lovely day in summer, lie halted the team to breathe on 
the brow of the hill. That he had a genuine love in his honest heart 
for the beautiful in nature as he gazed over the magnificent panorama 
of waving grain spread out before him, was evident when he turned 
to his companion exclaiming, " Well Bill, by ; IVe lived in nine- 
teen states and three territories, been whipped a thousand times, but 
T'm damned if I ever see so pretty a country as that." 



EARLY DAYS TN ROOKFORD. 59 

The first brick store on the east side occupied the site of No. 118 
South Madison street, and was built by Descombe Simons ("Buck "" 
Simons) in the summer of 1889. It was a two-story and basement 
building about 28x80 feet in size, and was taken down in 1887. 

Thomas Johnson, an Englishman, was the first cabinet maker in 
Rockford. He came here from New York city where he had worked 
at his trade for several years. On the trip west, he fell in company 
with William Peters, .John Beattie, D. D. Ailing and G. A. Sanford, 
the party arriving in Rockford early in the season of 1887. After 
making his claim on the " south branch," he set up his bench in one 
of the basement rooms of the Rockford House. In the opinion of 
those among the early settlers who still possess some of his furniture, 
a more accomplished workman has never handled a tool in Rockford. 
He made two eight square ottomans (we had no chairs) for my mother 
in the winter of 1887-8, that are as sound to-day as when they first 
left his hands. Mr. -Johnson made the first musical instrument con- 
structed in Rockford. I have the original subscription paper for the 
article, which is in the handwriting of my father, and herewith pre- 
sent a copy, verbatim ct Jitrratini of the document, so far as may be 
done with type. 

"We the undersigned, agree to pay the several sums annexed to 
our Respective names for the purtchs (sic) of a bass Drum for the use 
and accommodation of the village of East Rockford to be subject to 
the controle (sic) of a Certain number of Trustees to be chosen by those 
who are proprietors in the Instrument. 

Rockford, August (ith, 1888. 

pd Henry Thurston $2 00 

pd Daniel S Haight 8 00 

pd S C George 1 00 

pd Daniel Halsey 1 00 

pd .John B Clark 1 (M) 

pd Thomas Miller 1 0(l 

.James B Martyn 1 (ui 

pd L & W Bundy '. 1 00 

pd .James T Taylor 2o 

Harmon Loomis 1 00 

Pd Little & Bockus 1 00 

Col .T L White ,50 

.John ( ' Kemble 1 00 

P Alexander H Miller .50 

Harvey W Bundv 1 00 

pd F C Walker " .50 

Doct Goodridgh 1 50 

It will be observed some of the subscribers were "dead heads,'" 
as has pi'oved the case under like circumstances in after years. In- 
closed with the subscription list was the following bill made out in a 
different handwriting : 



60 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKPORD. 

AUGUST (i, 188H. (?) 

to 1 Drum $12 00 

4 Bunches cord 1 00 

2 hundyd (sic) Brass nails 25 

1 buncti tacks 8 

1 pair of drum sticks oO 

to Lumber for drum 1 02^ 

Straps for drum 1 8S 

to 1 doz of scruws (sic) Sli 

1 paint brush l§i 

to 1 thoushand (sic) of tacks 12^ 

to 1 drum hook 1 00 

19 Oil 
Rec'd of Henry Thurston payment in full of above bill." The re- 
ceipt of payment is written in pencil and is indistinct. Mr. Johnson 
went to California in 1862, as near I can ascertain, and i-eturned once 
since then for a short visit with his old friends. The drum itself, 
went the way destined for all bass drums. When Haight left the 
town he turned it over to me. Shortly after I loaned it for some fes- 
tival at Twelve Mile Grove, and in the fracas a wagon pole demol- 
ished it. 

Levi Moulthrop, the dry goods merchant on the west side, sup- 
plies me with the following- facts relating to his father : "Levi Moul- 
throp, M. D., was the first practicing physician in Winnebago county. 
He was born at Litchfield, Conn., Nov. 1st, 1805, and attended school 
there during his boyhood. Later on he studied medicine and gradua- 
ted from Fairfield College, New York, January 23, 1884. The follow- 
ing winter he migrated west, locating at Ottaway, Illinois, December 
1, 1834, where he commenced the practice of his profession. The 
wonderful beauty and many advantages of the Rock River Valley 
were then being heralded far and wide, influencing Doctor Moulthrop 
to make the trip on horseback in the autumn of 1835 to this county, 
where he purchased a claim of several hundred acres in what is now 
the town of New Milford. June 30, 1840, he was married to Margaret, 
eldest daughter of Sampson and Ann George, from Yorkshire, Eng- 
land, who with their family arrived at Rockford in the autumn of 
1836. Doctor Moulthrop died September 12, 1840." 

Among the skilled physicians who were here at an early day. 
Doctor Josiah C. Goodhue should, and did then, occupy a prominent 
position. He was not only skilled in his profession as then practiced, 
but his knowledge had a wide range, and his intellectual strength 
enabled him to grapple with any subject or opponent that might foi- 
the occasion be present. He was a teetotaler in those days of the uni- 
versal use of strong drink, but chewed tobacco immoderately, which 
habit caused the boys to i)i'()inptly dub him '"Old Froth," a title by 



KARLY DAYS INT ROCKFORD. 61 

the way they were wise enouj^h not to apply in his presence. He was 
a fluent exlemporaneons speaker, and few indeed there were who 
could compete with him in argument. It was his delight to draw out 
the opinions of others, and regardless of his own convictions upon the 
subject, take the opposite side of the question. He was a skilled chess 
])layei'. most urbane and gentle in his manner when the occasion 
should demand, and quite otherwise when the time and the patient 
would require an opposite style. He never would admit his patients 
were sick. When called to prescribe for some rough character, he 
would look at the i^atient for a moment, note the pulse and symptoms, 
and address him something after this fashion. '* Sick, you're not half 
so sick as you will be. You d — m fool, why did you send for me ?"' 

A story was current, and from a personal knowledge of both the 
M. D's, I have no doubt is authentic, which ran something like this : 

Doctor heard that Doct. Goodhue had said that he, Doctor 

had killed Smith's child ; so he called to see and question him in re- 
lation to the rumor. Doct. Goodhue saw him coming and surmising 
what his eri'and might be, met him at the door with his most cordial 
urbane manner. "' I am very glad indeed to see you sir — come in."" 

This warm reception rather abashed Doctor -, but he went in and 

stated his errand, saying, ''Doctor Goodhue, I hear you have said 
that I killed Smith"s child. "" Doct. Goodhue promptly interrupted 
him, saying, "'Haven't you killed more than one? Lord, I"ve killed 
more than forty ! If you haven't killed more than one you are no doc- 
tor at all I I ! " 

Some one said to him that he could not give up the use of tobacco, 
whereupon he threw away his cud, and for twelve months never put 
a particle of the weed in his mouth, when he again commenced its 
use saying he "knew it was good all the time.'' His death resulted 
from an accident brought about by the character of the man. He 
could not, and would not be dictated to, or ordered by any person. 
He was called to prescribe for some of the family of the late Richard 
Styles, four miles west on the State road. Aftei- caring for the pa- 
tient he accompanied Mrs. Stoughton to her home, but a few rods 
away on the opposite side of the road. When they got inside the 
gate — it was a dark night — she told him they were digging a well in 
the yard, and to remain where she had placed him until she returned 
with a light. Before she could get back, he had fallen into the exca- 
vation. He was taken out as soon as possible and revived sufficiently 
to ask what had happened. When told, he replied it would be fatal. 
Peace to his ashes. To the writer he was ever most kind. 

Col. James Sayre, who migrated from New Jersey to Juliet (now 
.Toilet) in the 30's, came to NewV)urg in the spring of ]8oo and erected 
a grist mill there, the first in the county, which began to grind early 



62 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

in the winter of 1837-8. I went there witli a bushel of wheat on ray 
pony the third day after the machinery started. There was no bolt- 
ing apparatus at the time and the meal was sifted by hand. My rec- 
ollection is the machinery was crude and the site as a mill, was aban- 
doned soon afterward. 

Samuel ("Sam "') Little, an Englishman, opened the first bar (sa- 
loon) in .Tune, 1837, on the spot now occupied for the same business by 
Fritz Spahr, at 316, East State street. He built a small one-story 
building, the length of the longest piece of siding to be obtained at 
Kent's mill. This building fronted west, but he afterwards turned it 
to front on State street. For the majority of years since this site was 
first occupied, it has been used for the sale of liquor. I speak from 
personal knowledge in stating that there has never been a business 
day in Rockford since the 12th day of March, 1837, when a glass of 
liquor could not be purchased in the town. I also state upon the same 
authority that nine hundred ninety-six (996) barrels of whisky were 
sold in 1857, from the store now standing at No. 314 east State street. 

Since the introduction of King Gambrinus, the consutnption of 
strong liquors in proportion to the population in the city has decreased 
largely. In the early 60s, in company with others one warm after- 
noon, I was in Schicker's basement. The beer was cool, we were 
hungry and the pretzels appetizing. Among those present was 'Moe'' 
Schmauss the elder. ".Joe," said I, "how much beer can you drink 
and not become intoxicated; just enough to feel good V " Well, I 
don't know, Mr. Thurston, but I think about forty glasses ! ! " 

For six weeks dui-ing the winter of 1837-8 there was no tobacco 
for sale in the town, and the discarded quids were carefully laid aside 
to dry for smoking. Great was the joy when word came that J. C. & 
C. Waterman had opened a store at Newburg, supplied with an abun- 
dant stock of the weed. The boys " chipped in " and despatched one 
of their number for a supply, his contribution to the fund being doing 
the errand. In less than three hours after his departure, "Old 
Hays " was descried by anxious eyes approaching the town, his horse 
on a smart gallop, and holding an immense plug of tobacco in each 
hand, with which he belabored the animal as he rode through and 
around the starving crowd. The supply having been divided, "Old 
Hayes" collected his tithe, and when the circuit was completed, had 
more tobacco than any three of them. 

Early in the winter of 1845, an eccentric genius who signed his 
autograph " .Julius P. Bolivar McCabe," made his advent into Rock- 
ford and for the time being domiciled at the Washington House, 
"Judge'' E. S. Blackstone, proprietor, which was also my abiding 
place. MacCabe had a genius for collecting statistics and compiled a 
census of the town which may be relied upon as correct in all the 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 63 

statements made. He was a dissipated ehai-acter and thorough dead- 
beat, tinally becoming so disagreeable, that at the united request of 
the boys as well as the earnest solicitation of "• Judge '^ Blackstone, 
who could not turn him out of the house to perish, I drove him to Be- 
loit and left him in the bar room of the tavern there. 

MacCabe claimed to be a profound mathematician and set sums 
foi- myself and other youngsters. He told us to multiply 20£ by 20£. 
That problem being solved, he required we should multiply 19£, 19s, 
lip 8f by 19£, 19s, lip, 3f, and when we produced an aggregate ap- 
proximating to the English national debt, confoundod us by referring 
to our solution of the first example. I think Judge S. M. Church may 
remember how anxiously we appealed to him for aid by which to get 
ahead of Mac. 

The evening of August 6, 1882, the Rev. G. R. Van Horn, at the 
Centennial church, preached an historical discourse on *■' The Growth 
of Methodism in Rockford," which was afterwards published in the 
Gazette, and from which I make the following extracts : The reference 
to the organization of the first religious society in the county, is pre- 
cisely as I remember a statement made by the late Samuel Gregory 
at a camp meeting in 1840. 

"In the Rfjckford Forum," published by Austin Colton, of Decem- 
ber 3, 1845, appears a well written article of historical value, from the 
pen of Julius P. Bolivar MacCabe, in which he makes the following 
statement : 

The first religious services held by a white congregation in Win- 
nebago county, were held in a log house belonging to Germanicus 
Kent, at Rockford in .June 1835. Rev. Aratus Kent a Presbyterian 
clergyman of Galena, was the preacher and the families of Messrs 
Daniel S. Haight and Germanicus Kent 17 in number, then consti- 
tuting all the white inhabitants except Mr. Stephen MacK were pres- 
ent. 

■'Methodism was introduced in the following year. In July 183(5, 
William Royal preached in the house of Heni'y Enoch, seven miles 
northeast of Rockford."' My recollection of Mr. Samuel Gregory's 
remarks in 1840, are that a party of five persons went from his home 
to Mr. Enoch's cabin in a wagon drawn by oxen, and he gave the 
route they pursued which was a short distance east of the spot where 
he then stood. (J. H. T. ) "• Mr. Royal was then in charge of the Fox 
River mission and traveled over a circuit which embraced twenty- 
eight preaching places. On his return to attend the annual confer- 
ence which met at Sjjringfield he passed through Rockford and on the 
second day of September 1836, he preached in the log house of Samuel 
Gregory, which stood then on what is now block 14 in Woodruffs 
second addition to Rockford. Ninth street bounding it on the west. 



64 KARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

Eightli iivunue uu the south. At the ch>se of his sermon he organized 
the flrst Methodist class, comprising live persons, namely : Samuel 
Gregoi-y, Joanna Gregory, Mary Enoch, Daniel Beers and Mary Beei-s. 
Samuel Gregory was appointed leader/' * * * * * 

-;,• * * * •::• * * * -;■;- 

The first quarterly meeting ever held in Rockford was held late 
in the summer of this year (1838), in a harn belonging to Daniel S. 
Haight, and the barn was located south of State street, between Sec- 
ond and Third streets, facing east/" (This is a mistake. It is the 
same barn I mention in my description of the town when I arrived 
and faced north and south. Haight sold it to Frink & Walker who 
moved it to the locality where it stood when the conference occupied 
it, and then faced east and west, and was being finished by its new 
owners for a stage barn. J. H. T. ) "The frame of that barn was 
bought some years afterwards by Isaac Rowley and removed two miles 
east, where it was set up and enclosed, and where it stands to this 
day ; its oaken timbers still sound as tlie doctrines preached within it 
during that meeting.'" 

The first camp meeting in this county was held in the summei- of 
1840, on ground then belonging to Daniel Beers, on Pike Creek, prob- 
ably a mile north of the Turner place on the State road ; Nathan 
Jewett presiding elder. I was there three days, and most of the time 
for four nights. It was there where I heard Mr. Samuel Gi-egory 
make the statement of the first organization of the Methodist church 
in the county. The attendance was large, particularly so on Sunday, 
when a much larger audience was assembled than had ever before met 
in the county. 

In my scrap book I find a clipping fi-om the liockford Jotirnul of 
January 7, 1876, (which is here appended) of which the late Hiram R. 
Enoch was editor, and as he writes from personal knowledge, it may 
be accepted as authentic, regarding the early history of the Metho- 
dist church in Winnebago county. 

'■ Historicus"" of the Gazette h-An commenced correcting errors in 
the published chapters of his history of Winnebago county. If '•'His- 
toricus "" stops to correct all the errors he has made in his history, he 
will not get along very fast. One error in a recent chapter was so 
glaring that it is hardly worth while to correct it, yet we will do so. 
He said "the hrst Methodist sermons were preached in 1838 in the 
house of Mr. Boswell on the east side of the river."" Now the fact is, 
the first Methodist sermon in the county was delivered in June, 1836, 
in the house of Heni-y Enoch, 7* miles from Rockford, in what is now 
the town of Guilford. The first M. E. society in Winnebago county 
was also organized there in 1836. with live members ; this member- 
ship being Daniel Beers and wife. Samuel Gregory and wife, and Mrs. 



EARLY DAYS TN ROOK FORD. (>'•> 

Henry Enoch, mother of the writer, and A. I. Enoch. Thiw soi;iet,v 
was the organization' on which ihe First .NT. K. clmreh of Rockford 
was afterwards based. ■" Historicvis "" should brush up a little or his 
hislory will not be any more reliable •" than last year's almanac." 

<^uite a noted charaetei- in his day and time, known by the sobri- 
quet of "Thousand Legs." was Jonathan Weldon. of Westlield. the 
grandfather of the person of the same surname now residing- there, 
and intimately connected with •■Heaven." (?) who was recently de- 
livered of a female child, as that community assei-t from imrtiaculate 
conception. He was among the first settlei's in tlie county, and I think 
had located in Westfield before I arrived. It was a current story in 
early days that Richard ]\Iontague said he left New Hampshire, not 
only to better his ccmdition. but also in the pleasing belief that he had 
succeeded in getting away for all time from the locality infested by 
Jonathan Weldon. To his utter disgust, almost the (irst person he 
encountered when he arrived at Rockford was "Thousand Legs." 
His sobriquet originated from personal deformity of his legs, and to 
the best of my knowledge his wife, whom 1 ne\(n- saw. was deformed 
like unto her husband, but worse. In short the couple wei'e such as 
well informed peojile unite in the belief should not be allowed to pro- 
pagate the species. His a])pearance as he swung along the trail on 
his crutches, and he could only do so for a short distance, was a sight 
to be avoided by hysterical females. His head, arms and body were 
large and muscular, and his appearance from his waist up. was as de- 
picted of John the Baptist. The man was intellectual and shrewd. 
In one instance, single and alone, he successfully opposed the entire 
bar of the county in a case where a road was pi'oposed to be laid 
through his land, the judge deciding there was not a legal road in the 
county. He was the cause of constant strife and tui-moil in his neigh- 
borhood, and one dar-k night was taken from his house by a disguised 
party and carried out on the jn-airie. where they made ])reparatiojis 
as he believed at the time, to hang him: but after a consultation took 
him to a school house and left him in the lire place covered with tar 
and feathers. He was the only man I ever mel. who when casually 
about the house when dinner- was to be served, whom Henry Thurston 
did not invite to dine with him. Thousand Legs and myself fell out 
at an early day. and from his manner in aftei- years. I am confident he 
never forgot the incident. In the winter of 1889-40.1 was crossing 
the river on the ice afoot, and at the east sh(n-e found him sitting in a 
jumper with the shafts broken, and unable to help himself. Two 
sleighs had passed him while I was on the ice, both leaving him to 
get out of the difficulty as best he could. He appealed to me for as- 
sistance, and I went to my sister's house and got a clothes line which 
9 



6fi KAltl-Y DAYS IN KOC'Kt'OKO. 

1 had tKjught and given her a few days previously from my pocket 
money — coin of the realm being a scarce commodity — and tied tlie 
shafts of the jumper so as to enable him to drive up the hill while I 
walked beside the vehicle and halted him in fj-ont of Potter & Pres- 
ton's store, telling him to go into the store and get a rope as I wanted 
that one. " To whom my good lad does this bit of cord belong V"" "I 
bought it for my sister. Mrs. Shaler."" "Ah! I see Mr. Shaler in 
front of the postoffice, I will mention it to him/"' and he immediately 
started 5,ind drove to the office. "■ Good afternoon Mr. Shaler, I trust 
thee and thy young wife are in the possession of sound health this 
beautiful winter day. Thee can see my jumper has met with a slight 
disaster. The lad informs me the cord which enabled me to get up 
the hill belongs to thee, and if thee will allow me to retain such as 
may be required, my ready hands will repair" — "Certainly, most 
certainly. Mr. Weldon, you are entirely welcome to the line." "No," 
I broke in, "you d— d old cuss ; that cord is mine," and I rapidly un- 
tied and took it off, leaving him in the condition in which I found 
him, to the intense amusement of the bystanders. 

Thousand Legs carried on his farm quite as successfully n,s the 
majority of the settlers, notwithsta^nding the deficiency in his means 
of locomotion. He was among the first in the county to raise mules, 
and nearly fifty years ago had in his ])ossession a large Spanish Jack, 
gentle and kind in harness, which he sometimes drove to town. If 
there are any of the whigs or democi-ats of 1H42 still remaining in 
Rockford, they may recall an episode in which .Tohn Bierer. a young- 
lawyer. Thousand Legs, and the jack pai-ticularly, were prominent. 
One pleasant day in Autumn, an assembly of some fifty ])eople had 
gathered on the northeast corner of State and Madison streets, in 
front of the Rockford House. Thei-e were no buildings on the west 
half of that lot at the time, and John Bierer, who had been sent out 
from near Pittsburgh, Pa., to " grow up with the country " mounted 
a dry goods box placed at a convenient place on this open space, and 
began addressing the audience upon the advantages of a home mar- 
ket—a la McKinley. Biei-er was in full view of both the Rockford 
and Washington houses, and the loungers of the two hostolries wei-e 
speedily congregated on the front steps. Among others who had been 
attracted to the spot was Jonathan Weldon. who with this jack hitch- 
ed in the shafts of the wagon in which he sat, was in front of the Rock- 
ford house facing south. As Biei-er got well warmed up on his sub- 
ject he was in the midst of a flight of rhetoric, when the jack lifted 
his head and tail and saluted with a voice like a fog-horn— hee haw ! 
hee haw ! ! hee haw I ! ! Bierer maintained his composure, waited 
until the animal had ceased; made some pleasant allusion to the inci- 
dent and went on with his speech. A few moments later when the 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. fi" 

effect of the concert had partially subsided, the jack again lifted his 
voice, this time with increased volume, his head and tail vibrating 
perpendicularly as the volume of sound rose and fell. Hee haw I heo 
haw ! ! hee haw ! I I came from his lungs with the blare of a thousand 
trumpets, when some person thrust a shingle profusely ornamented 
with tacks, under the root of his caudal appendage, and away went 
the jack with Thousand Legs behind him, down the trail to the ford, 
disappearing in a cloud of dust. There was no more political speak- 
ing that day, but the way the politicians '' set 'em up " wa.s a caution. 




("liAPTEK Vn. 

T)ie CcilU Winter of lyjy-a— Two Feet of Snow Ain-il Isl. 1813— Pork Seventy-Five 
Cents per 100 lbs. - Deer Killed With Clubs- The Belle of the Jumper-Girls 
Have One Di-ess— Boys One Suit — Cuncly Pulls, Quiltings and Fandangos— Wheat 
Three Shillings per Bushel in Chit-ago— Steamer N. P. Hawks- Murder of John 
Campbell— Lynching of the DriscoH's— No Place for Boys -Watching the Stable 
for Horse Thieves— The Devil of the HorkfonI .v/(^/- ■ t'onniiunications in the 
l!nrh-f„ril Shir. 

'Vhv winti'i' of Ls42 ;> was thi' ludsl I'l'Uiarkable in tlie severily uiul 
long- contiriiiance of c-old, as well at- Ihe great amount of snowfall, that 
has ever transpired since lite first settlement ol the county. Among 
my memorandum ol '■ Early Days." I lind a record in letters and lig- 
ures as follows : ■' Tht- i-iver fiu/.e over November 19. 1842"" which 1 
assume to be eoriect. although uiy impressions are it was earlier. The 
river closed in one night during a furious snow storm, the ferry boat 
running freely previous to that. The earth was not frozen at the 
time, and remained in tlial condition in the thickets and beside the 
fences where the snow banked up to the top rails, until the lirst of 
April. 1841' : on that day in tlie woods between Hockford and Belvi- 
dere it was two feet deep on a level. The cold was intense. 1 have 
no record of the tettiperature. but 1 do know the whisky in the jugs 
the teamsters carried in their sleighs, was slushy with ice, and ti bar- 
rel of Judge Black'stone's whisl<y with a leaky faucet, that Dan How- 
ell had on tap in liis store roon: in tlie Uockford House, was connected 
to the lioor with a pillar of ice On the prairie where there was a 
fence on bolh sides of the road, it tilled full. On the open prairie, the 
snow in the road was from four to si,\- U'.v\ dee]j. As each passing 
team broke the crust, the wind tilled up the track, elevating it above 
the surrounding surfat-e so as to make it almost impossible for teams 
to pass without turning over. There was a January thaw of sutticient 
duration to carry off nearly all the snow on the prairie, with the ex- 
ception of that in the roads and lying along the fences, when it again 
froze, and a fall of snow came equal to the first storm. I never heard 
the faintesi whisper of suffering among the .settlers. There was an 
aVjiuidaucc ef food : too much in fact for the c(Misumptioii of the peo- 
ple, and (juite a porlion of the surplus could not be sold for cash, even 
at H Horninai pricr. Drcssfnl pork from the Rock River valley. st)ld 



KARLY DAYS IN ROC'KFOKD. H'.t 

in the lead mines at. from seventy-tive to one dollar twenty-tive cents 
per one hundred pounds, and in Chicago the highest price was less 
than two cents per pound. A story was current of one fellow who lost 
a dressed hog- ott' his load in Pigeon Woods, and when his neighbor 
behind called his attention to it, drove on without halting to pick it up, 
saying '■ it don't weigh but a hundred." I was in Galena during the 
thaw in .January, and when I left the town, the streets and surround- 
ing hills were naked. I had left home the week before with a neigh- 
bor and ii load of cheese that we peddled through ShuUsburgh, New 
Diggings, Benton and Hazel Green. From Wadams Gi'ove to (iratiot's 
Grove across the prairie it was eighteen miles without a house, the 
road following in most places the identical spot now occupied by the 
track of the Illinois Central railroad. The deer yarded in the timber, 
and the skin hunters drove the poor creatures with curdogs into the 
crust, and killed them with clul)s for the hides. 

To the youngsters of 1 li;i1 winter it was a season of supreme enjoy- 
ment. To myself personally, ii was glorious. While I write, memory 
carries me back, and 1 sec a yt>ung fellow roaming over the snow, and 
stretching away through the trackless waste came visions of Para- 
dise. Since then I've often been sleighing with a swell-box cutter, 
luxurious robes and silver bells, but there has neve?- })een music so 
sweet as that from the Belle of the Jumper. 

The public balls of that dyy and time were as innocent and void 
of immorality as any of the select gatherings of modern days. We all 
had friends and acquaintances in Beloit. Belvidere, Nevvburg, and 
Freeport, and often visited those towns. Distance was not considered 
if the party wanted to go. The girls had one dress carefully trea.s- 
ured for special occasions, and the boys one suit, looked after with 
solicitude. There was always a girl with needle and skilled hands to 
darn or patch it as niiglit be required. The singing and spelling- 
schools, and particularly the candy pulls, quiltings, and fandangos in 
the log cabins, have never since been equaled in genuine, unalloyed 
fun and happiness, '■(xo it while you're young, when y()U gel old you 
can't."' 

I have a letter dated at Waukesha, Wis.. December 14, I88(i, from 
Daniel Howell, in which he (confirms my I'ecollections of the low pri- 
ces for produce in the early forties. xMr. Howell writes : "■ 1 am moi-e 
than glad to receive youi- letter, and wish I could remember more to 
put in this. If I had some one to talk with about old times. 1 would 
remember more. 1 went to ll<ickr()r(l in May. 1S4(I. succeeding a Mr. 
.lohnson in the htockford House. Haighl and ()li vr owned the prem- 
ises. The i-eiit was $;i.")(l \vv \eai'. Hoard liiree dollars i)ei- week. 
l'ric<_' for man and team overnight, witlunit grain, was seventy-live 
cents. whiskv tlirowu in. We I'ould stand all that, as the whisk-v was 



70 EARLY DAYS IN UOCKFORD. 

:i. hjliilliiiy- per yallou. Wheat taken to Chicago sold there for three 
shillings per bushel : pork seventy-tive cents per hundred pounds." 

In the country taverns east of Rockford the rate for man and teani 
without g'l'ain overnight, was five shillings, with whisky upon the 
same terms Mr. Howell mentions. In September, 1842, I tool< a 
load of wheat to Chicago that sold for forty-two cents jjer bushel. 
There was such a jam of teams on South Water sti-eet I could not get 
to the warehouse without falling into line early in the day, so I car- 
ried a sample to the steam grist mill on the west side. There being 
no oats in the grain, it was inspected by the buyer as " I'ed winter ;'" 
the additional price obtained about squared my bill at the "'Illinois 
Exchange "" on Lake street. Mark Beaubien proprietor, who kept that 
hostlery, fiddle included, after the manner and style recorded in the 
early pages of these ''Reminiscenes.'" 

Early in 1841, a small steamboat, the "N. P. Hawks," built by a 
man of that name at some place near the headquarters of the Rock, 
came down the river and lay at the landing- on the east bank for some 
weeks while a cabin was being- constructed on the deck of the boat. 
The vessel had grounded repeatedly while on the trip, but finally 
reached the Mississippi some time during the summer and remained 
there, to the great disappointment of the people, and particularly so 
to those who had assisted, or promised to assist in its construction, 
with the expectation that the boat would make regular trips on the 
Rock during the season of navigation. This boat left Rockford about 
the 22nd of June 1841. as Mr. Howell writes me that with Mr. Haight 
he accompanied the vessel to Dixon, and while on their way back, at 
Oregon City, they heard of the mui'der by the DriscoUs, of -lohn Camp- 
bell, President of the Ogle county Regulators, and joining the party 
of citizens from that towii made their way to Washington Grove, 
where the Rockford posse had William DriscoU in custody. 

The lynching- of the Driscolls was one of the few stirring events 
of that time in this neighborhood at which I was not present. When 
I went home for my hoj-se, my father forbid my going, saying it was 
■• no place for boys," and he kept such supervision of my riding nag. 
that I had no opportunity to get astride of him. Only those who have 
])assed through a like ordeal can understand the intense excitement 
that pervaded the community. The loss of his team was often utter 
I'uin to the settler, and he was ready to protect his property regard- 
less of ])reliminary legal proceedings. My father who was a light 
sleeper, has coine to my bed in a dark night telling me to get up and 
go to the stable. Aly gun was heavily charged for such occasions and 
I would slip out of the house and crawl on my hands and knees about 
the yard. On one occasion (this was at Harlem) the dogs just at night, 
drove a man out from under the bridge across Willow Creek. Foi- the 



KaRLY OAYfi IN ROCKFORO. 71 

next thi-ee consecutive nights I lay in the manger in tlie stable with 
my gun beside me. and would have been justified in shooting any man 
who opened the dooi* at unseemly hours. Fortunately or unfortunate- 
ly .as the case may be, I was not subjected to the trial. 

For the six months preceding- tlae lynching, I was the "devil "" in 
the office of the " BocJcford Star,''' Philander Knappen editor, and had 
developed unusual speed and accuracy as a compositor, but was almost 
useless in all other liranches of the iiraft, the I'esult being that I was 
kept at the case, the manuscript in particular being my copy. The 
schooling I received in the printing office was all I ever had after I 
came to Rockford, and has been invaluable to me in after years. As 
this may be a fitting occasion to I'elate my further con nc^'tion with the 
'• art preservative,"" I will add that after the dissolution of the " Star," 
I assisted in the distribution of the "pi."" and getting out the first 
four numbers of the "Pilot" which succeeded it. Fnrly in the win- 
ter of 1S41-2I entered the office oi the " Ckkago I )i /hoc rat." where I 
remained some two months or more, and might have become a full- 
fledged printer, but for tlie attempt of " Long .Tohn"" to have me carry 
stove wood from the printing office on the third Moor of No. 107 Lake 
street, to his private office adjoining the City Hotel on CUarke street. 
I bolted at this, telling Mr. Wentworth he might remove his office to 
Sheol f(n- all I cared, iitid abandoned the craft then and there for all 
time. 

The material in the ••Star" office was owned by D. S. Haight. 
Daniel Howell. Adam Keith, and possibly some others; Knappen be- 
ing- simply a tenant. He had been in Rockford but a short time, and 
did not realize the temper and determination of the settlers to rid 
themselves from thieves, of whom the Driscolls and Broadies were 
the most prominent. At the time of the destruction of the office. 
Knappen was living at Harlem with a newly married wife. Word 
was sent to him of what had been done, and he speedily put in an ap- 
pearance. The raiders had simply taken the forms of one side of the 
papei" and turned them upside down on the floor, and they were not in 
very bad shape either. When Knappen came he stirred the "■pi'" 
laying on the Hoor with the stove shovel, and mi.xed the fonts of type 
in every case in tjie office. He turned over the subscription list to 
Howell of the Rockford House, where the office foi'ce boarded, and 
abandoned the whole thing. 1 do not think '• Dan."" realized a dollar 
from the assets placed in his hands. In his editorial opposing the 
measures of the regulators, Knappen hoped to increase the circulation 
of his paper, and to bring notoriety upon himself. He gave both sides 
a hearing in the " Star,'' as will appear in the two following- commu- 
nications which I have been requested to publish. I put them in type 
mvself. and thev went the rounds of the Union. The one signed "'Vox 



/2 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFOKO. 

r^oinili," I presume to have been written l)y Jacolt B. Miller. The 
one sijined --B."" I know to have been written by Charles Latimer. 
He also edited the ■" Pihtl." (although his nnmodid not appear in the 
[)ai)er. ') until the ndvent of John A. Brown. 

/•'/•';//, ///, Uiirkforil Star of Jill ;i /. ;s^;. 

A HEART-KENDINtt SCENE. 

To the Editor of tin Bocl-ford Star: 

Would to (xod that the veil of oblivion mioht be di-Hwn over the 
scenes of bloodshed which have been lately enacted in our neig-hbor- 
hood ; but they are too glaring to escape the w'ovld's gaze, and too re- 
volting to civilization and the laws of humanity not to receive the just 
reprobation of every law and order-loving individual. To 2)revent 
misrepresentations and exaggeration, it may be well to give an au- 
thentic account of the proceedings up to this time, of the " Ogle Coun- 
ty Lynching (Tub"" — a Banditti oi'ganized ;i few weeks since in the 
adjoining county south of us. composed of i)ersons who appreciate ihv 
truth of the saying that •' in union there is strength." for the purpose 
of visiting with summary inmishnienl any individual or individuals 
who might cross them, or in any manner offend a member of the 
"club." Banditti-like, after organization, these fiends in human 
shajie scoured the surrounding country for plunder— not, ijei'haps. 
valuable goods, but the liberties and lires of their fellow citizens I 
Everyone who happened to fall under the suspicion of one or more of 
their gang was at onc^e brought before their self-constituted tribunal, 
where there was no difficulty in procuring Ihe ready testimony for 
convicting him of any crime which should l)e named, when he was 
sentenced, and men apijointed to mllict tlic adjudged punishment ; 
which in the embryo existence of ••clan." generally consisted in giv- 
ing the culprit from 20 to 800 lashes, well laid on the bare back, and 
ordering him. under the penalty of receiving •• a double dose next 
time,"" to leave the country immediately. Things went on gloriously 
for the •'gang"" some considerable time. A great number of convic- 
tions took place ; and the sentences wei-e executed without opposition 
fi'om the victims. At length they "caught a Tartar:"" some poor 
fellow who had been forced to feel the iron grasp of the mob from such 
testimony as had been manufactured for finding him guilty, set him- 
self at work for revenge, actuated by the same spirit manifested by 
the "Lynchers."" A sawmill belonging to .John Long, one of the 
Bandits, was about this time burned— the work undoubtedly of some 
innocently whipped individual. Long resigned and retired from the 



KARLY DAYS IN ROCKFOKIJ. 73 

club. A new soenu of lynching- was now commenced, in which every 
one the least liable to suspicion of setting fire to the mill or any other 
offense, was made to feel the lash. Soon after these outrages, as 
might have been looked foi" by every one acquainted with human na- 
ture, Campbell — the then captain — was shot by two of the subjects of 
the displeasure of the mobocrats. It was done in the light of day, at 
his own house, in the presence of several witnesses, in a manner that 
bespoke the spirit of revenge for injuries innate in the breast of every 
human being, reckless of consequences. David Driscoll and William 
Bridge were proven to be the perpetrators of the crime. This occur- 
red last Sunday, 26th of June. 

Now, as a matter of course, the excitement was alarming. The peo- 
ple of this vicinity, as well as from the neighboring towns of Daysville, 
Oregon City and Rockford, turned out on Monday for the avowed pui'- 
pose of arresting, if possible, the persons who had thus outraged the 
laws of the land. They met upon the scene of the unfortunate occur- 
rence, and, without making the first effort to pursue and bring to jus- 
tice the guilty, forthwith took into custody John Driscoll (the father 
of David Driscoll, who assisted in the murder of Campbell,) and his 
son William, and after burning to the ground their dwellings and out- 
buildings, lodged them for the time being in Oregon jail. 

On Tuesday they were escorted by the mob to Washington Grove, 
in Ogle county, four miles from Oregon, when and where the usual 
one-sided exparte trial in cases of suspicion, was granted them. Af- 
ter raking and scraping testimony from every nook and corner of the 
promiscuous assemblage, some of whom were in attendance merely 
"• to see the fun," even that jury could find them guily of nothing more 
henious than a blood connection to David, one of the individuals for 
whose blood they thirsted ! — thus reasoning that they were accessory 
to depriving Campbell of his life. They were therefore sentenced to 
be executed, and one hour only was granted them to prepare for that 
'' journey from whence no traveler returns." The friends of the vic- 
tims of mobocracy will, perhaps, be pleased to learn that two clerical 
gentlemen with the "klan'' kindly volunteered their official servi- 
ces in this case of emergency, and prayed with them that "the Lord 
would have mercy on their souls.'" The hour having expired, they 
were blindfolded and led forth to the distance of some ten steps from 
the demons who were now ravenous for their blood, and fired upon by 
each of the bandits who had a heart to do murder when he feared not 
the strong arm of the law, on account of the great number engaged in 
the horrid scene. 

To the praise of humanity be it recorded that many of the moljo- 
crats, upon "sober second thought." were anxious to retrace their 
10 



74 rOAKLY DAYS IN ROC'KFORD. 

steps — undo what they had done, by reprieving the prisoners. But 
their efforts to do away in their thinking moments what they had 
done in the heat of excitement, without reflection as to the legality or 
consequences of the same, were of no avail — they were the weaker 
party ; and the Driscoll's were literally cut in fragments by charges 
from rifles, muskets, and shot guns, while many who voted for the 
measure, upon witnessing it, became sick at heart and fainted. Some 
there were in that gang who had determined to imbrue their hands in 
the blood of the Driscoll's, and upon their heads be the crime. They 
are equally as guilty of murder as David Driscoll and William Bridge: 
and imagination will depict the ghosts of the murdered men hovering 
near them night and day, while they live. 

No one pretends that ,Tohn and William Driscoll had committed 
murder : nor can they say that they merited the punishment they re- 
ceived, even had they been found guilty by an impartial jvu'y of their 
country, of the crime alleged by the mob. No ; had unimpeac-hable 
testimony been brought to bear to prove them guilty of that which 
circumstantial evidence was horribly distorted to convict them, the 
penalty would have been but three to five years imprisonment in the 
penitentiary. 

To show the character of some wlio were engaged in this horrible 
tragedy, I will state that some three weeks since, John Driscoll was 
arrested for some alleged misdemeanor, by the "'Lynching Club." 
and, after being threatened with whipping and death unless he re- 
vealed the names of horse-thieves and counterfeiters belonging to the 
tribe, consented to give the names of certain persons suspected by 
him, intimating at the same time that some of the members of the 
"club''— then present — would curse the dav that the disclosures had 
been extorted. .Vii almost unanimous cry was i-aised. and he was set 
at liberty. 

And has it come to this — that in a land of civilization and Chris- 
tianity, blessed with a wholesome code of laws as man's ingenuity ever 
invented, a few desperadoes shall rise up and inflict all manner of pun- 
ishment—even DEATH— upon whomsoever they please I Shall all civil 
law be sacrificed and tramjjled in the dust at the shrine of mobocracy V 
Shall the life and property of no one receive any protection from the 
civil law, but both be subject to the nod of an inconsiderate and un- 
controllable mob V Shall these things be s<j ; or will the people rise 
up en masse and assert the sui)i'emacy of the laws of the land, and en- 
force the same against the marauders and lynchers V The latter 
course is certainly pointed out by JUSTICE ; and I trust in God that 
justice will yet be meted out to all who have had a hand in this bloody 
business. Vox PopuLi. 

Kishwaukee. .Tune 8(1, 1841. 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKPORB. lO 

SUMMARY EXECUTION OF THE MURDERERS. 

An excitement growing out of an attempt to suppress and rid the 
neighborhood of a gang of horse thieves and counterfeiters, that have 
for a long time infested this and the adjoining counties of DeKalb and 
Ogle, has resulted in the murder on Sunday last, of John Campbell, 
and subsequent summary execution of two of the gang of thieves and 
mui^derers. 

To the people of this vicinity it is hardly necessary to state that 
nearly ever since the first settlement of this region of the state, it has 
been overrun by a host of horse thieves and counterfeiters, which no 
means within the power of the law or its officers could restrain. Un- 
provided with jails as this newly settled country is. they have been 
apprehended only to escape and renew their depredations ; embold- 
ened by their numbers, and the absence of civil iwwer, they had be- 
gun to inflict punishment on those who dared to be active in their 
efforts to bring them to punishment. About three weeks ago a socie- 
ty was formed in the county most infested by these depredators, to de- 
tect and bring theiTi to i^unishment. The first act of the gang was 
immediately to burn the saw mill of Mr. John Long, who was chosen 
chief of the society. A threatening letter was written about the same 
time by Wm. DriscoU. one of the gang, defying the society to combat, 
and threatening the members with personal violence, and an effort, 
was made to concentrate the gang at his house, and to fortify and de- 
fend themselves. But it appears that alarmed at the danger of being- 
outnumbered and lynched, they separated without waiting the arrival 
of the people who turned out to capture them. However, the people 
succeeded in capturing two or three bi'others named Barrett, who had 
in their possession at the time, one or two stolen liorses. They were 
committed to the jail of Ogle county, from which in a few days they 
escaped. The company also flogged two fellows named Daggert and 
Bowman, and notified the family of Driscoll's to leave the country in 
15 or 20 days. This they were not disposed quietly to do. and Wm. 
Driscoll publicly expressed his opinion that it would be i^roper to 
shoot the chief of the society as had been done in Iowa, and that would 
scatter the company. Mr. Long's mill being burnt, and apprehend- 
ing greater injury, he resigned his position in the society and Mr. 
Campbell was selected in his place. The latter was a gentleman of 
great respectability, a member of the Baptist church in this place, 
and on Sunday last was at church here. 

That evening just at dusk as he was passing from his house to his 
stable, he was accosted by two persons. He had only time to utter 



T6 EARLY DAYS IN KOC'KFORD. 

■' DritjCoU," and to attempt to leap behind a gate post when one of 
them shot him through the heart. His wife, who witnessed the deed, 
ran toward hei- fallen husband and cried. " Driscoll, you have shot 
my husband !■" 

Mr. Campbeirs son, about 13 years of age, seized his father's gun, 
approached the murdei'ers within a few steps, and snapped it three 
times at one of them. They walked off deliberately. These persons 
:wrere David Driscoll and a notorious thief named Bridge. Of course 
Jbhe terror and excitement of the neighborhood was intense and terri- 
ble. No honest man's life or property was safe in the neighborhood. 
The whole country was next morning in arms — a few of our own towns- 
men went to the scene on Monday. The father, .John Driscoll, and 
two of his sons were apprehended. David and Bridge had made their 
escape. The prisoners were taken that night to the jail at Oregon. 
The next morning they were taken to Washington Grove, four or five 
miles from Oregon. Some two hundred and fifty people were as- 
sembled there to sit in judgment upon them. One of the sons was 
discharged there being no proof against him. But the father, John 
Driscoll, and his oldest son William, were found guilty of counseling 
and aiding in the murder, and upon the motion of the son-in-law of 
the murdered .John Campbell, it was resolved, unanimously, that they 
should be shot. One hour Avas given them to prepare for death, dur- 
ing a part of which time they joined a clergyman in prayer. At the 
expiration of the hour, the father was brought forth and shot, and as 
soon as possible thereafter the son suffered the same fate. They were 
both buried on the spot where they were executed. 

It is proper to observe here, that however abhorrent these facts 
may ai:)pear to those who neither know nor can appreciate the terrible 
state of dismay into which the people have been thrown and kept by 
the desperate deeds of these people, many of the most respectable cit- 
izens were most active in the proceedings. 

It is a terrible state of society, but when law is too weak to pro- 
tect, there is no security but in the resort to such means as heaven 
has given us for self-preservation. 

Mr. Campbell left a wife and six children, some of them quite 
young. Both DriscoU's had families. 

Of the particular facts proven against the Driscoll's upon their 
trial, I have not been informed, but after the trial Wm. Driscoll con- 
fessed that he had been concerned in the murder of five different per- 
sons, and in the robbery of a great many stores, and that he knew of 
the intended murder of John Campbell. B. 

Rockford, July 1, 1841. 



CHAPTER VIII. 



Harking Up Hill- The Only Boy in 1837-Parties Who Pied the SUir Oftice-A Grand 
Scoop— First Barber— Playing Brag with a Nigger— Beauty of Rock River - Swim- 
ming with a Horse-Strawberries in 18:37- Mrs. Giles C. Hard's Description of the 
Ford— First Bridge— Jesse Blinn on Bridges— Bridge Committee— Derastus Har- 
per Designs the Bridge— Description of the Bridge— Gone to the Hades— The 
First Man to Ride Across the Bridge— High Water in 1844— The First Dam- 
Pioneer Manufacturers— St. James Roman Catholic Church— First Watch Maker 
—First Bakers— First Lumber Dealers— First Lumber Dealers on the East Side 
—Black Walnut Lumber- First Orchard— First Nursery in Ogle County— Death 
of Col. Whitney the Pioneer Nurseryman. 

, Possibly it may have occurred to some of the readers of these 
'•Reminiscences,'' why it is that I, a boy in his first teens, should 
write so confidently and from personal knowledge, of scenes and events 
in and about the town in which grown men only were the actors? The 
explanation is this. I was city bred, born, and brought up in a large 
hotel, and from infancy had been trained not to take apparent notice 
of, and more especiallj^ never to speak about, or to comment upon the 
acts or conversations among the guests of the house. So confident 
was my father of the result of his training, that upon one occasion, 
when told I knew all about an affair it was desired to keep shady, the 
old gentleman replied, '•Well, if they expect to get it out of John 
Henry they're barking up hill.'" 

In 1837, I was the only boy in town of thii-teen years or more, and 
this Masonic trait becoming known, I was freely admitted into all the 
councils, games, and pastimes of the town, and this continued during 
the lifetime of most of the actors. When the Star office was " pied," 
by a mere accident I knew who did it, and the parties were aware of 
my knowledge ; they also knew I would not betray them. I never 
breathed a syllable of this for thirty years after, when I told an edi- 
tor of one of the local papers, that D. S. Haight, Charles Latimer, 
and Adam Keith were the men. To make a grand scoop for his pa- 
per, he came out that week giving details of the affair, and also of 
other similar items I related to him pertaining to still earlier days, 
stating them in such language as to leave the impression he wrote 



7N KARLY DAYS IN ROCKfOKO. 

from personal knowledge. He was six miles away at the time ; had 
no acquaintance with some of the parties, nnd knew nothing- except 
from hearsay. 

Reuben W. Armstrong, an ''American citizen of African de- 
scent," who came here from Columbia, Lancaster county, Penn., was 
the first barber in the town. He opened his shop in the summer of 
1845, in the basement of the "Arcade," Potter & Preston's brick 
building- on the southwest corner of State and Madison streets. Pre- 
vious to his advent, the boys cut hair for each other. In some instan- 
ces a fellow with his hat off presented a most grotesque appearance. 
In the summer of 1887, George Miller, whose haii- was black and curled, 
got out of the chair with a cross an inch wide on the back of his head 
where the hair had been shaved bare to the skin. "' Rube ''was a 
sport of superior skill ; a trait of character which may be inherit in 
the family, and competed successfully with any of Caucasian blood 
whom he could induce to play with him. I recall an incident in the 
early fifties, when a party of players in Peake's block were about to 
be raided by the police, when a prominent white man went out through 
the window taking the sash with him, rather than be found playing 
brag with a nigger. 

The beauty of Rock River has frequently been extolled in recent 
years by travelers and residents of the valley, whose appreciation of 
the lovely landscapes shown from its head waters to the Mississippi, 
have found expression in both prose and verse. The present condi- 
tion of the stream, disfigured as it is by the hand of man, can give but 
a faint conception of the appearance of its banks in a state of nature. 

In the immediate vicinity of Rockford. the remarkable beauty of 
the landscape excited my admiration, city bred boy as I was, when I 
followed the trail along the bank gun in hand, intent on potting a 
stray duck, while keeping a sharp lookout for the wild onions and the 
fish on my set lines, with which to eke out our scanty larder. The 
banks were bold and sodded to the edge of the water. There were no 
gullies where the sod had been cut out by running water ; little or 
none of the timber had been cut, and the earth was literally covered 
with flowers. In places, the bottom of the stream was nearly covered 
with clams and piles of shells a foot or more in depth, which the musk- 
rats left close to the edge of the water were frequent. We tried to 
prepare these clams for our table. I gathered half a bushel in twenty 
minutes in the immediate vicinity of the ferry landing in the summer 
of 1837, only to find they were too tough for my sound teeth ; and too, 
they seemed to destroy the flavor of the Hoosier bacon with its ac- 
companiment of live stock, to which I had become accustomed. 

Opposite to what is now Knightville, were two islands, the upper 
and larger one having a few small trees growing on its surface ; the 



KARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 79 

lowei' one covered with grass only. Some ten rods above Joualhau 
Peacock's place, was an island of about two acres, on which were oak 
trees twenty inches in diameter and a dense thicket of wild fruit. 
Just below this island was a sand bar ten to fifteen rods long. The 
main channel of the stream was on the east shore, and it was here we 
went in swimming. I wonder if the youngsters of the present day 
know how to manage horses in deep water, a knowledge essential to a 
pioneer V My pony was as tractable in deep water as a dog, and we 
both leai'ned the art there under the instructions of a Hoosier. If 
you must swim for life or necessity, strip the horse of all trappings 
except the briddle ; unbuckle the throatlatch in order to get rid of it 
if required ; separate the reins, which should not exceed three and 
one-half feet in length, and when the animal is in deep water grasp 
the hair of the mane close to the withers with the hand holding the 
reins and lie down on his back. He may be gviided by the reins or by 
patting his neck on either side with the diseng-aged hand ; more es- 
pecially so if he is a trained riding nag. 

.Just above the present site of the water works the channel shifted 
abruptly to the west shore. There was a dense thicket on the site of 
Thomas Scott's coal yard and the Kenosha car tracks. Below State 
street, and extending to the ford was a grove of tall, thrifty white 
oak timber. The bluff below the ford was sodded to the edge of the 
water and crowned with a row of red cedar trees. In June, 1837, for 
a week or two, the side of this bluff was fairly red with strawberries. 
On the west shore below the abutments of the C. & N. W. railway 
bridge, the river widened abruptly, and the banks were lined with 
tall timber to the mouth of the creek. Above this bridge for half a 
mile the ground as far west as Main street, was covered with brush 
eight to ten feet high, with an occasional black oak tree. In June 
there were acres here where one could not step without crushing the 
strawberries. Some twenty rods above G. A. Sanford's I'esidence on 
Main street, and extending west in places as far as Court street, was 
a thicket of twenty acres or more, so dense as to be impassable except 
at the expense of torn clothing and loss of time. At the ferry land- 
ing on the east side, the bank rose by a succession of steps, the lirst 
of about six feet, the next of fifteen, when it was level for some ten or 
twelve rods ; the wagon trail at this ix)int meeting the foot of the hill 
150 feet north of State street, when it turned southeast, reaching the 
top of the hill at the intersection of State and Madison streets, where 
the earth has begn cut down nearly or quite fifteen feet. 

The ford was the only one on the river l)elow the mouth of the 
Peeketolika (that was the way it was spelled in the report of the lirst 
election in 183B) which could be relied upon in ordinary stages of wa- 
ter. For not less than 150 feet in width, the depth of water, which in 



80 EARIA" DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

summer just (hovered the fuiward axle of a wagon, did not vary six 
inches, the rock bottom being as smooth as a floor. 

Mrs. Giles C. Hard, whose husband was the ferryman in 1841-2 
and earlier, speaks of this ford as •' a most useful highway just as na- 
ture formed it, I saw worlds of covered wagons, cattle, horses, hogs 
and sheep trailing across the ford, the most of them going to settle in 
Stephenson county. No ferry such as we had, could have taken across 
the river all the people and stock that I saw ford the stream during 
the low water of 1841-2." 

In the forties, a law was smuggled through the legislature taxing 
the river counties for the improvement of the navigation of the 
stream. A coffer dam some fifty feet wide was built through the rap- 
ids, a wheel at the lower end propelled by the current bailed the wa- 
ter out, and a steamboat channel excavated in the fall and winter of 
1845-6, the rock being piled just outside the dam. It ruined the ford 
and was absolutely useless for navigation, as the rapids at the mouth 
of the river in ordinary stages of water, would not float a steamer. 

The first bridge at State street was not the first bridge across the 
river in the county. In the winter of 1844-5, I crossed the river with 
a horse and buggy on a bridge at Roscoe, and I crossed on foot at 
Rocktou (Pecatonica then) on the stringers of a bridge at that place. 

In my scrap book I find an item relating to early bridges, in the 
remarks made by .Jesse Blinn at the re-union lield at the Holland 
House. Thursday, February 9, 1871, by the ''Rockford Society of 
Early Settlers."" To the fourth toast — "'The descendants of the Pio- 
neers of Winnebago County, chips of the Oii block,"" Mr. Blinn made 
a few pertinent remarks. He ''did not believe, and it was no dis- 
credit perhaps to the chips, that they could not fill the places and en- 
dure the hardships of the ''old blocks." That with all our boasted 
generosity, a liberality that bestows princely sums for almost every 
conceivable object, yet it falls short today of that of the old blocks I 
What did they do? We had no court house or jail ; there were no 
bridges across the river, the old, slow, poking ferry must be used or 
the people could not cross the river. The land had come in market 
before the settlers had obtained money sufficient to pay for it, and 
many of them liad to borrow money at exorbitant rates of interest. 
This had not been repaid ; and they were struggling on, poor crops 
and low prices came year after year, yet they wanted bridges, a court 
house and a jail, and the old blocks said let us build ; and they did 
build. Many of you remember that in one season we built the present 
court house and jail, fenced them in and gave them to the county, and 
also five bridges across Rock river. One here, one at Roscoe, one 
where the iron bridge now stands at Rockton. one at ' Macktown." 
and one above the mouth of the Pecatonica." 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 81 

I also find in my scrap book an item stating that the building com- 
mittee for the first bridge at State street were "•£. H. Potter, Daniel 
Howell, Williard Wheeler, C. I. Horsman, and G. A. Sanford." It 
was built by subscription, and my impression is the largest cash dona 
tion, came from Frink &, Walker, the stage proprietors. 

Derastus Harper, who resided on the west side, designed and 
erected the bridge. He possessed mechanical skill and ingenuity of a 
high order. He afterwards went to Chicago, where he became the 
city engineer. He designed and built the first pivot bridge across the 
Chicago river. I make this statement about the pivot bridge from a 
conversation I recall to memory between the late .Tohn Beattie, Wm. 
F. Ward, (who were house joiners of acknowledged skill,) and myself. 

The State street bridge was of three strings of lattice work made 
from oak planks fastened together with oaken pins. It was as tough 
as whalebone, and although it wabbled and shook from end to end 
when loaded with one or more of the six horse teams that crossed tlae 
stream, it never went down when there was a support between the 
shore end of the lattice and the water. None of the structures which 
succeeded it, could have sustained a tythe of the grief this old bridge 
endured. 

Mr. Harper laid out and framed the bridge on the ground, com- 
mencing at the shore on west State street, extending in the direction 
of the present site of the Silver Plate works. Each plank of the lat- 
tice was laid in position and the holes bored by hand, when one or 
more pins were inserted to hold them in position. There was no iron 
used save the nails that held the half inch basswood boards which 
covered the lattice when the structure was finally completed. There 
were abutments of stone on each shore. On Christmas night, 1844, 
the lattice was in place for about seventy feet from the west shore, 
supported by temporary trestles ; ice had formed about the trestles 
from the west side ; the water rose lifting the whole structure, tres- 
tles included, when it tipped over with a tremendous crash. There 
was a ball that night at the Rockford House, and when the sound 
came, we of the male persuasion bolted for the river, exclaiming "the 
bridge has gone to the hades." We did not then realize the skill and 
ingenuity of Mr. Harper as a bridge builder, or the admirable quali- 
ties of the material he had selected, which the limited means of the 
people could supply. The fallen lattice was hauled out of the water, 
each plank numbered with red chalk, and aside from a few that were 
splintered, they were again placed in proper order. The bridge was 
opened for travel July 4th, 1845, and it was estimated 2,000 people 
crossed that day. When the last plank was laid, E. H. Potter mount- 
ed a horse standing thei"e, and was the first nuin to ride across the 
11 



82 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

bridge, so he aftei-wards told William A. Manning, now residing at 
Santa Barbara, California. 

There were two roadways, separated by the center lattice which 
projected about five feet above the planking ; the rule of the road be- 
ing the same then as now, passengers kept to the right, those of 
the male persuasion vaulting over the lattice when the inclination 
prompted. 

The dam, which was above the bridge near the present site of the 
water works, broke three times after the bridge was completed. The 
first time near the west end in the spring of 1846. The next time in 
the spring of 1847, taking the saw mill of Phelps, Daniels & Gregory 
on the east side, disarranging the trestles of the bridge on each occa- 
sion, and getting the lattice out of line. 

June Isl. 1851. the old dam went out breaking away at the west 
bulk head. The rush of water carried away an acre or more on the 
west bank and also undermined and swung to the east, the lowei- ends 
of the first two trestles from the west bank, and disarranging some of 
the others, letting the south lattice down about seven feet below the 
other side. Either side was still available for foot passengers, and a 
horse could have been led or rode across with safety on the upper side 
had necessity required, but the ford was preferi-ed. With a tythe of 
the present machinery available, the bridge could have been raised 
and made passable in a few days, but the only material at hand was a 
scant supply of rope and blocks ; and too, there was no one competent 
to direct the work who would take it in haud. After several abortive 
attempts, William F. Ward was persuaded to oversee the work. Un- 
der his direction it was finally raised and put to use. It was as crooked 
as a cow path, and shook and wabbled from center to circumference, 
but held on faithfully to the last, when it was re-placed in 1854 by the 
covered bridge. 

Tlie high water in 1844 throughout the northwest does not appear 
to have been mentioned in late years. What the flood may have been 
on the lower Mississippi I do not know, but at and below St. Louis the 
river was twenty miles wide, flooding the American Bottom from 
three to twenty feet deep. At St. Louis, steamboats were loaded fi'om 
the windows of the second story of the stores on the levee. At Kas- 
kaskie, in this state, a steamboat ran out two miles from the main 
stream, laid the gang plank from the deck into the window of a nun- 
nery there and took the women aboard. A young fellow who was try- 
ing to open a farm on the American Bottom opposite St. Louis, caught 
a hog-trough floating down stream, and paddled across the river in it 
to the west shore. I saw in Galena, in 1845, a steamboat that had 
grounded 800 miles up the river, on the prairie three miles from the 
channel ; the water fell and left her high and dry. The machinery 



KARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. .S3 

was tjiken out and preparations made to burn the hull for the purpose 
of securing the iron, when the water rose and floated the boat into the 
channel. In this vicinity the roads for most of the summer were 
nearly impassable for anything but oxen. Merchandise was hauled 
from Chicago with a team of three or four yokes of oxen, the driver 
riding through the creeks and sloughs on the yoke between the heads 
of the wheelers, controlling the team with a Hoosier whip, which with 
the lash, measured thirty feet or more in length. There has been no 
such season of continued high water in this locality since that year. 

From my scrap book, from personal recollections, and from items 
supplied to me by Messrs. James B. Howell, L. B. Gregory, and from 
Mr. John Nettleton, now of Los Angeles. California. I have compiled 
thp following account of the old dam. 

The dam was located a few rods above the present site of the watei- 
works. Just above this place the main channel of the stream shifted 
abruptly from the east to the west shore. On the east side at the loca- 
tion of the dam, the water for two-thirds the width of the stream, was 
about waist deep in summer, with eight to nine feet in the channel. 
To the best of my recollection, the reason this site wa« selected was 
the genei'al belief that if the dam was located at the head of the rap- 
ids, the town, as well as the business centre, would concentrate there. 
And too, another reason may have existed. Had it been built at the 
ford on the rock bottom the material would have cost cash, a commod- 
ity the pi'omoters of the enterprise did not possess except to a, limited 
extent, while timber, brush, stone and earth could be made available 
at the site chosen. 

The mill race on the east side extended to Walnut street, and was 
about twenty feet wide. At this point Williard Wheeler had a saw 
mill. Just above, James B. Howell had carding and fulling machin- 
ery. At State street, on the south side of the street, was Nettleton's 
grist mill. At the head of the race, A. C. Spafford and L. B. Greg- 
ory had a saw mill. There may have been other machinery in opera- 
tion when the dam broke, but the above is all that I recall on the east 
side. On the west side at the head of the race was a saw mill built by 
Thomas D. Robertson and Charles I. Horsman. Just below this mill 
Orlando Clark had an iron foundry in a stone building. The race on 
the west side was about fifteen rods long. 

A Mr. Edward S. Hanchett, who resided in Freeport, had charge 
of the construction of the dam when it was first commenced, the pro- 
moters of the enterprise supplying the material on the banks. Mr. 
Hanchett had built one or more dams on the Pecatonica in the vicin- 
ity of Freeport previous to his advent here. He finally abandoned 
the work and C. C. Coburn, who resided here for many years after, 
completed the job. 



84 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFOKD. 

Mr. L. B. Gregory supplies me with the tollowing : " John 
Phelps, J. T. Daniels, and L. B. Gregory built the saw mill on the 
east side, and I think started in the fall or winter of 1845. T. D. Rob- 
ertson and C. I, Horsman built the saw mill on the west side. I do 
not know when it started or that it ever did much sawing. The dam 
broke three times ; first near the west end, I think in the spring of 
1846 ; the next I think was in the spring of 1847 near the east end and 
took oft" our saw mill, landing two bents down on Long's island. A. 
C. Spaffoi'd bought Daniels out and I bought out Phelps. Spafford 
and I brought the timbers back and got the mill sawing in the spring 
of 1848. The last break was June 1st, 1851." 

From Mr. James B. Howell I have the tollowing: ''The enter- 
prise in which I was interested consisted of wool carding and cloth 
dressing. The first situation on lot 5, block D. The foundation walls 
were built in 1845 and the structure in 1846. Owing to the repeated 
breaking away of the dam, water for power was not supplied until 
July, 1848, when work was commenced, and long waiting ceased. The 
one machine for carding when complete, cost me nearly or quite $500, 
and the cloth dressing apparatus fully as much more, while the whole 
outfit including lot, building, and power to propel the works, reached 
a totel of $2,000 or more." 

" When the old dam gave away, which it did on the first day of 
June, 1851, I removed the carding machine to New Milford, and ran 
it in an upper room of Mr. Fountain's factory, returning to Rockford 
in June, 1852, and as soon as water was let into the race, was ready 
for operations again. I have the pleasure of believing that my wheels, 
both under the old and present power, were the first to do service in 
Rockford." 

Mr. John Nettleton, now of Los Angeles, California, writes me in 
relation to the first grist mill in Rodkford, which was built by his 
father and himself. 

"Moses Nettleton, my father, was born near the village of Pres- 
cott, Augusta township, Canada, in 1798, from which place he emi- 
grated in 1839 and settled in Ogle county, Illinois. In the fall of 1844, 
he in company with myself, went to Rockford, and after investigating 
the water power he contracted for the lot on the east side of the river 
next south of the city bridge, and also for water to run a mill. The 
following winter — 1844-5, we got out timber for the frame, and saw 
logs for lumber, near Jefferson, Wisconsin, to inclose the mill, which 
we floated down the river in the spring of 1845. Before reaching Be- 
loit, we learned that both the Beloit and Rockford dams had gone out 
in the high water, and we tied up our rafts and went down the stream 
to investage. During the following summer we floated the timber to 
Rockford, got stone and laid the foundation for the mill. I think the 



EARLY DAYS IN KOCKPORD. 86 

mill was started sometime in the year 1846, but am not certain as I 
was absent. L. B. Gregory and A. C. Spafford can give you more ac- 
curate information as to the time of starting the mill than I can. It 
was first started with two run of stone, to which a third was added 
about two years afterwards. It cost between three and four thousand 
dollars." 

I have been able to obtain but little official data from which to 
give the early history of St. James Roman Catholic Church, the first 
of that denomination in the county. The Rsv. Father Flaherty, who 
now has charge of the parish, examined all the documents in his pos- 
session and supplied me with .such information as they contained. I 
also wrote to Bishop Feehan, asking the date of dedication, etc., and 
received a reply from the Chancellor, which is here appended. This, 
together with my personal recollections, is all the information I could 
secure. 

•' Chancery Office, Chicago, Dec. 16, 1890. 

Dear Sir : — In regard to St. James, Rockford, I am sorry that I 
find very little information, as nearly all our records were destroyed 
in the ' Big Fire.' The oldest deed I find is of 1851, conveying from 
Artemas Hitchcock and Mary his wife, to Rt. Rev. James Oliver Van 
de Viller, for the sum of $150, lot No. 1, in block 26, as found in the 
map of the village drawn by Duncan Ferguson. Second, a conveyance 
(warranty deed,) from John Lee and wife Catherine, to Anthony Re- 
gan, Bishop of Chicago, for $400, lot No. 2, in block 26. The first is 
recorded February 15, 1851. The second, August 17, 1855. This is all 
I can ascertain concerning the eai'ly days of Rockford. 

Very truly, P. J. MULDOON, Chancellor.'' 

From Father Flaherty's notes gathered from the books of the 
church, "• the first record of baptism is by John A. Hampston. He 
was in charge from 1851 until 1854." Father Hampston, who died 
while in charge of the parish and was buried under the church build- 
ing, I remember quite well. He was of studious habits, modest and 
retiring in manner, and highly i*espected by the few outside his con- 
gregation who made his acquaintance. The church building was a 
small one story wood structure, to which the citizens of the town con- 
tributed a portion of the means with which to erect it. 

Alexander Brazee, from Brandon, Vermont, was the first watch 
repairer to locate in Rockford. I am told he first opened his shop in 
1840 on the west side, on the site of Daniel Dow's block. Personally, 
I do not recall his presence there as so eai'ly a date, but I do know his 
shop was there the winter of the deep snow — 1842-3. In the fall of 
1841, Mr. Brazee occupied the front room of Tinker & Johnson's tailor 
shop on the site of No. 322 East State street, and for some years after- 



Sfi EART.Y DAYS IN HOCKFORD. 

wards was located at 303 East State street. He built the two story 
and basement bi'iek dwelling which stood on the southwest corner of 
First and Oak streets, known as the " pepper-box." He went across 
the plains to California in 1850, and about 1852-3 died in Oregon. 

Wyman & Houghten (Ephriam Wyman and Bethel Houghten,) 
were the first bakers. They opened a boarding house and bakery in 
the spring of 1S38, in the buildiug now standing. No. 506 South Main 
street. Mr. Wyman was born in Lancaster, Mass., January 20, 1809; 
he arrived at Rockford, September 20, 1885. Mr. Houghton came 
from Keene, New Hampshire, where he was born in 1808 ; he came to 
Rockford in the fall of 1836. When Wyman arrived there were three 
families on the east side : Daniel S. Haight, Eliphalet Gregory, and 
James Wood. On the west side : Germanicus Kent, John Wood, and 
James Boswell. 

John Edwards, a native of Acton, Mass., was the first dealer in 
pine lumber in the town. Mr. Edwards came to Rockford in 1850, his 
family arriving the following year. His first yard was near the pres- 
ent site of the Union Foundry and Peter Sames" wagon factory, near 
the Northwestern railway tracks. Most of the lumber he had while 
at ihis place came by team from St. Charles, and the amount of stock 
on hand at any one time from ten to twelve thousand feet. After- 
wards his yard was located on the northwest corner of Church and 
State streets, the lumber being hauled from Elgin. He did not pile 
the lumber at either locality as is the rule at present, each wagon 
load being packed by itself. Prices as given by a member of his fam- 
ily were : $24 to $3o"for No. 1 ; $18 to $20 for No. 2; $14 to $18 for No. 
3. At times he had great difficulty in getting the lumber from the 
end of the track at Elgin, as the teamsters who had hauled wheat to 
that place, would throw off half the load in Pigeon Woods when stalled 
in the mud, and leave it there. 

Regan & Perry (M. H. Regan from Canada— Seely Perry from 
Massachusetts) were the first to establish a yard of pine lumber on the 
east side of the river in 1851, on the northeast corner of State and 
Second streets. The lumber came from Chicago to the end of the 
track of the Galena & Chicago Union R. R. ; the average amount of 
stock carried the first year, being about 50,000 feet, at a price in the 
vicinity of $12 per m. Since this yard was first established, Mr. Perry 
has been continuously engaged in the lumber trade, being now identi- 
fied with the Rockford Lumber and Fuel Company. 

Before the advent of the railroad, the local dealers at times had 
a few pine boards for sale, which had been brought out from Chicago 
by the teams hauling wheat to the lake port, tne freight being from 
five to six dollars per m. and paid in "store pay.'' 

There was quite a large quantity of black walnut timber on the 



EARI.Y DAYS IN ROOKFORD. 87 

Pecatonica bottoms and elsewhere, which was cut and used freely for 
local consumption in the early days. The siding of Haight's dwelling 
house on the corner of State and Madison streets, was of black wal- 
nut, as was most of the studding and siding of the Washington House. 
In the fall of 1838, I gathered the nuts in the immediate vicinity of 
Trask's bridge, and could readily have secured a wagon box full with- 
in a quarter of a mile of the crossing place. In recent years I have 
heard it remarked upon, that the early settlers should have been so 
shiftless as to have cut this timber which has since become so valua- 
ble. It goes to show how little some of the present generation under- 
stand the conditions of life as they then existed ; for a short experi- 
ence only is required, to pi-ove that the proper time to use material 
of this kind, is when it can be made available. In 1839, Reuben Bar- 
rett of Harlem, made two fence gates of black walnut lumber, which 
were in use on his farm at the time of his death in November, 1872. 

In my scrap book I find an article cut from the Chicago Times of 
January 25th. 1878. containing a synopsis of a paper read by Jonathan 
Periam of Chicago, at the annual meeting of the Northern Illinois 
Horticultural Society at Franklin Grove, Illinois, and hei'e append 
such items contained in the paper as pertain to this vicinity : 

" In Winnebago county the first orchard was stai'ted by Doct. 
George Haskell, at Rockfoi-d, in the year 1839, and some of the trees 
yet remain. He also established a nursery in 1840 or '41 from trees 
obtained at Alton. In Ogle county, orcharding was begun in '36 from 
grafted stock by Mr. Walmsey.'" 

(I think this pioneer nursery in Ogle county was located about 
one mile and one half above Byron on the west bank of the river, 
where the bottom land is surrounded on the west and north sides by 
a high bluff, as I saw a small nursery there of trees some three feet 
high in the winter of 1838 -9. The claim was purchased by Henry G. 
R. Dearborn, from Boston, Mass., and I recall the fact that the nur- 
sery was a factor in the long price paid for the improvement. J. H. T.) 

'' About the year 1840 the first orchard was planted in Lee county, 
principally of seedlings. The first nursery was established by Mr. 
Whitney." Prom my scrap book I take this item in relation to the 
pioneer nurseyman of Lee county, cut from the Rockford Republican: 

[ '-Dixon, III., June 12, 1891.— (Special to The Eepublican.— Col. 
Nathan Whitney died this morning of old age. He was born Janu- 
ary 27, 1791. He came here in 1835, and was a commissioner to organ- 
ize Lee county. He held three commissions from De Witt Clinton of 
New York— cajjtain, lieutenant, and colonel. He was in the engage- 
ment at Fort Erie in the year '1812. At his death he was the oldest 
Mason in the world, having been initiated June 20, 1817. He planted 



88 EARLY DAYS IX ROCKFORD. 

the first nursery north of the Illinois river, and was widely known all 
over the northwest."] 

"In those old days our sauce was made of wild plums, our mince 
pies of crab apples and venison, soured with vinegar, sweetened with 
watermelon syrup or wild honey, and spiced with the pounded bark of 
sassafras. The prairie region of Illinois was a wilderness of grass, 
only pastured here and there by herds of half wild cattle, and with 
the log cabin and beginning of a farm at long intervals. In the year 
1839, Joseph Periam built the first frame barn in Cook county. In 
1838 he planted a small nursery of apple and pear seeds, peach, plum 
and cherry stones. In 1839 he set out the first orchard of grafted fruit 
in Cook county. The trees were hauled from Ohio in a wagon." 



CHAPTER IX. 

First County Fair in l&ll Held on the East Side— Committees— Premiums— Address 
by Doct. Goodhue— Locality of the Cattle Pens— Couldn't Pay Ferriage— A Pound 
of Sugar and a Bushel of Wheat— Couldn't Cast a Shadow— A Load of Oats for a 
Pair of Boots— Doct. Goodhue's Prophecy— Primitive Habits— A Sea of Grass— 
Wherell We Stay To-night- Pioneer of Stephenson County — His Daughters — 
The Cabin— Where Shall I Sleep— Disrobing— Politics in 1840— The Band— Old 
Jake— Arkansaw Traveler— The Harrison Ball— The Van Buren Ball— The Tick- 
ets — Doct. Crosby and the Upper Reel— Pigeon- Winging — Long John Went- 
worth. 

I also find in my scrap book an account of the preliminary pro- 
ceedings, and the first Agricultural Fair and Cattle Show held in this 
county, which was compiled by R. P. Porter for his History of Win- 
nebago county, and published in the Gazette in 1876. This, with my 
personal recollections, may serve to give some idea of the agricultural 
situation at that time. 

"• The year 1841 saw the birth of the Agricultural Society. Though 
not the same society as the present one, it was of course the embryo 
from which the present association sprung. In September, a meeting 
was held to make the necessary arrangements for the ensuing cattle 
show on the 18th of October, when the following resolutions were 
unanimously adopted." 

''^ l^csolvcd, On motion of J. S. Norton, seconded by Geoige W. 
Lee, that the Annual Fairs be held at Rockford, alternately on the 
east and west side of the river, commencing the present year on the 
east side." 

" Resolved^ That all the available funds of the Society be distrib- 
uted in premiums on the day of the cattle show, and that the prem- 
iums be paid in agricultural publications." 

Eesolved, That George Haskell, .Jonathan Weldon, and George W. 
Lee be a committee to prepare a code of By-Laws for the Society." 

" Resolved^ That with a view of extending the benefits of the "Win- 
nebago County Agricultural Society, of enlisting the combined efforts 
of the farmers of this county in sustaining the society, J. Weldon, Esq., 
was appointed our agent to obtain members of the society, and to col- 
lect the monies for the same, which will be devoted to the payment of 
the premiums at the ensuing Cattle Show." 
12 



90 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

^^ Be solved. That the Society meet at 2 o'clock p. m., on the 13th 
of October, and form a procession under the direction of Jason Marsh, 
Esq., marshal of the day, and march to the jilace appointed for the de- 
livery of the address." 

^^ Resolved, That Daniel S. Haight, Doct. Josiah C. Goodhue, and 
Charles I. Horsman be a committee of arrangements to prepare a place 
for a show, and make all the necessary preparations for exhibitions, 
rent a room for the delivery of an address, and for faciliating the pas- 
sage over the ferry." 

'■Jason Marsh was appointed marshal of the day; Isaac N. Cun- 
ningham, J. Weldon, and Sebbens Wilson committee on horses; Mil- 
ton Kilbourn. Horace Miller, and Samuel Hayes on cattle; Isaac M. 
Johnson, J. S. Norton, and Ezra S. Cable on sheep; Charles I. Hors- 
man, Alonzo Corey, and Jason Marsh on cultivated lands; Benj. T. 
Lee, Peter Johnson, Daniel S. Haight, Peter H. Watson, and James 
B. Martyn, on hogs; Shepherd Leach, Henry Thurston, and William 
E. Dunbar on domestic articles." 

' ' There was no necessity to print a premium list. The whole busi- 
ness was published in a couple of sticks of solid minion in the Rock- 
ford papers. There were seven premiums for horses, six for cattle, 
four for hogs, and two for sheep. One for the best cvdtivated ten acres 
of land, one for the best 25 tbs. of butter, one for the best cheese weigh- 
ing 15 ft)s., one for the best 10 yards of flannel, one for the best 50 skeins 
of silk manufactured in the county, and one for the best sugar made 
from beets in the covmty. This was the extent of the premiums offer- 
ed in 1841 by the first cattle show ever held in Northern Illinois." 

" The cattle pens had been erected in a little grove adjoining the 
village, where the various committees met at 11 a m., and forthwith 
proceeded to make an examination of the animals in the Society pens. 
The exhibition of domestic articles took place in the hall of the Rock- 
ford House. At 2 o'clock the procession formed under the direction of 
Jason Marsh, marshal of the day, and marched to the court house 
which was then on the east side, near the northwest corner of Market 
and First streets. Here a large crowd of ladies and gentlemen had as- 
sembled. The meeting was opened by prayer by the Rev. Mr. Joel 
Potter." 

"It was not deemed necessary in those days to send abroad for 
speakers. Rockford talent was above par in 184:1, so Doct. J. C. Good- 
hue delivered the address, of which the published report says: It was 
listened to very attentively. The Doctor's address was both practical 
and illusrative, and contained just the lessons which, if put in practice 
by our fai'mers would secure happier results to their agricultural 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 91 

labors. He dwelt with great effect and eloquence upon the bright 
prospects which await the farmers of this fertile valley, and presented 
a practical knowledge of the subject, which showed that he had not 
studied alone in the school of Esculapius. At half past five the com- 
mittees handed in their reports. And thus the first Cattle Show in 
Northern Illinois was begun and finished in one day." 

The Rockford Pilot, published the next day, commented on the 
Fair in the following terse manner: 

" The cattle show came off' yesterday in good style. The day was 
fine, the women were fine, the pigs were fine. The display of stock 
certainly exceeded our anticipations. Surely, we live in a wonderful 
age. Mobs, miracles and morality ai"e developing in a manner that 
would have bothered the brains of our grandfathers. Here we are in 
a country that six years ago lay in the precise state in which it was 
moulded in the palm of the great builder — not a tenement had ever 
been erected in this precinct to cover the head of a white man. Yes- 
terday we saw a thousand people collected for the great object of im- 
provement in the science of agriculture, and a disjilay of domestic 
stock that would have been creditable to any portion of the United 
States. We saw silk that had been manufactured by the hands of the 
ladies of our place, and a variety of products that show the rapid 
strides that we are making toward perfection in the noble science of 
agriculture." 

Although I did not attend Doct. Goodhue's address, my recollec- 
lections of the day are quite clear. The stock was exhibited in the 
grove on the east side, in the immediate vicinity of the northeast 
corner of First and Oak streets. Cattle and horses were tied to the 
trees, while sheep and hogs were confined in sqviare rail pens corres- 
ponding in size to the length of a rail. Garden and other products 
were on exhibition in the hall of the Rockford House. Henry Thurs- 
ton brought in a mammoth squash weighing 108 pounds, and took sec- 
ond premium; while Charles I. Horsman carried off the first premium 
with a specimen weighing 128 pounds. There were several loads of 
grain exhibited in wagons standing in the street in front of the Rock- 
ford House; among them I recall a wagon-box full of white corn on the 
ear — a new variety at the time — shown by John Paul, the school teach- 
er of 1840-1, who told me he would not have been there but for the 
ferry being free that day, as he had no money with which to have 
crossed the river. At and about this time, a bushel of wheat would 
not buy a pound of loaf sugar, but could be exchanged for dry goods. 
There was no cash market for grain except to a limited extent. The 
tavern keepers paid ten cents per bushel for the few oats they re- 
quired, and the Goodhue's of Beloit, and Judge Blackstone, whose 



95i EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

distillery was located on Tui*tle Creek, six miles from that town, were 
occasional buyers of corn for cash, to be used in the manufacture of 
whisky. The Judge's expression that '• the people were so d — d poor 
they couldn't cast a shadow," was most appropriate. Some years since, 
Oliver A. Larkins told me he hauled a wagon load of oats and put them 
in Dan. Howell's grain bin, telling Dan. that if he would pay for a pair 
of coarse boots for which he was indebted to E. H. Potter, it would 
be satisfactory. 

Notwithstanding the gloomy financial outlook. Doct. Goodhue saw 
with prophetic eye the future destiny of this region. In the winter of 
1838-9 I heard him state his firm belief that the Valley of Rock River 
would become the garden of the Union; that the water power at Rock- 
ford would be utilized, and the town become a second Rochester; 
which prophecy is nearly accomplished, as the present population of 
the town is almost equal to what Rochester, N. Y., possessed at that 
time. 

The primitive habits of the people are well illustrated by an inci- 
dent wherein I was one of the parties, and at a time when it may be 
supposed the people were conq^aratively well provided with the con- 
veniences and comforts of a well ordered household. 

In the fall of 1845, a young gentleman from Uniontown. Pa., well 
dressed, and evidently accustomed to the habits of polite society, came 
in the stage to Rockford, on his way to visit some friends who lived, 
he said, on Rock Rnn, twelve miles from Freeport, and he employed 
me to take him up there. We left Rockford in the afternoon with a 
horse and buggy, and I drove to Trask's bridge, crossed the 
Pecatonica and after driving through the timber, struck 
across the prairie for Rock Run. Even then the country 
was all open; it was literally a sea of grass, and one could drive 
where he pleased. When I came to a track leading in the direc- 
tion I wanted to go, I took it ; otherwise, straight across the prairie 
for a point on Rock Run twelve miles from Freeport. The young fel- 
low was nervous with his first experience of a trip through the wilder- 
ness, and when I left a beaten track, propounded a series of questions 
something like this : "Where are you goingV" "How do you know 
you are rightV" "Where will we stay to-nigh tV" "Do you see that 
post?" "Yes ; I've noticed several of them." "What are they for?" 
" They are section posts. We are traveling due west on a section line 
that strikes Rock Run within one mile of a point twelve miles from 
Freeport." 

Just at night we drove up to a settler's cabin and found we were 
two miles from our destination. In the conversation the settler ascer- 
tained where the young fellow was from, and as he had migrated fro m 



EARTHY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 93 

Uniontown, he invited us to remain with him overnight. I told the 
young- fellow we had better do so, as we might get sloughed, which he 
didn't exactly understand as neither of us carried any whisky, and it 
was decided to stay there. The settler, who was one of the pioneers 
of Stephenson county, had pushed out from Uniontown when a young 
man ; had married on the frontier, and with his wife and two children — 
girls ; one about eleven, the other perhaps fifteen years old — was then 
living in the original log cabin which he put up to hold the claim. It 
was built in true pioneer style without a nail ; the I'oof of shakes, the 
door, floor and fireplace of puncheons, the fireplace lined on the inside 
with clay, and the chimney of split sticks laid up with mud. In one 
corner at that end where the fireplace was, were a few boards support- 
ed by pegs in the logs which answered as a cupboard: in the other 
corner at that end was a ladder to go aloft. At the opposite end of 
the cabin were two beds — one in each corner: one of them had a cur- 
tain suspended about it; the other had nothing of that kind, being 
fully exposed. After a bountiful supper, the settler produced some 
clay pipes, some home grown tobacco and we sat before the fire and 
smoked. The settler had many questions to ask of Uniontown and its 
people, and the young fellow was much interested in what they told 
him of their life, particularly so in what the wife said she had under- 
gone in making their claim and getting it under cultivation. 

The young fellow with his well-fitting clothes and pleasant easy 
manner, was an object of intense interest to the two girls, brought up 
as they were in the wilderness, and they watched his every motion, 
and hung upon every word he said, with ears, eyes, and mouths wide 
open. At the usual bed-time, I asked the wife where I should sleep? 
She told me there, pointing with her thumb over her shoulder at the 
bed without curtains. I carried my chair to the bedside, undressed as 
deliberately as I ever have before or since and got into the bed. Di- 
rectly the young fellow asked the wife where he should sleep? She 
told him there, in that bed with me. He carried his chair to the side 
of the bed, took ofl' his coat, vest, and necktie, laid them over the back 
of the chair and sal down on the bed, while all three kept up a lively 
conversation. The settler sat on one side of the fireplace, the two girls 
on the other, while the wife sat in front of and facing the fire. The 
young fellow pulled olf his boots and finally got rid of his stockings, 
during all of which tim3 they kept firing questions at him, with the 
two girls gazing in open-mouthed curiosity at his appearance. At last 
he unbuckled his suspenders, threw them over his shoulders, and sat 
down on the side of the bed, when it dawned on the mind of the wife 
that he didn't propose to pull off' his trousers while the two girls were 
looking at him, so she spoke to her daughters and they all three went 
out doors, when he undressed and got into bed. 



94 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

I was too young at the time to have had a personal knowledge of 
the inside political work going on in 1838-9, and the early forties, and 
can only state that being well mounted, myself and pony were frequent- 
ly called upon as bearers of dispatches for the Democrats, to which 
party I then adhered from inheritance, and in mature years from con- 
viction. The facilities for communication were so meagre in 1840, that 
the official vote of this State in the Harrison campaign, was not known 
until late in December. I infer the vote was intentionally kept back 
by the Democi^atic officials at Springfield. A messenger from the cap- 
ital with the official vote of the State, passed through Rockford some 
ten days in advance of its publication in the Chicago papers, commu- 
nicating the news to the prominent men of the party in each village 
for betting purposes, Illinois being one of the eight states that voted 
for Van Buren. Haight gave me the figures the same day he received 
them, and I carried them to my father at Harlem. Whatever may 
now be thought of the proceeding, the old gentleman did "bet on a 
sure thing;" my own share of the winnings being a pair of coarse boots. 

The spai-eness of the population, the limited amount accessable of 
the cui-rent literature of the day to which some of the settlers had 
been accustomed; the almost entire deprivation of the pleasures of so- 
cial life among the older people, caused them to enter into a political 
or local contest, with a vim which almost invariably became personal 
before it was decided. When the fight was ended, the passions cooled 
down, and "sober second thought" had resumed its sway, it frequent- 
happened that both parties joined in a general pow-wow and celebra- 
tion. It was so in 1840. The Whigs of this locality imitated the tac- 
tics so successfully practiced throughout the Union. They had no 
cider either hard or sweet, but they did possess in abundance, all the 
paraphernalia used by the party in the populous parts of the country. 
They put up a log cabin in regular pioneer style, on the southeast 
corner of State and Madison streets, for political headquarters, pro- 
fusely decorated with coonskins and other regalia pertaining to the 
times; imported speakers from Galena, Chicago, and intermediate 
points; got up processions, and with Frank Parker blowing an E flat 
bugle and China Parker a clarinet — neither of them having the slight- 
est knowledge of music, and each blowing with might and main in a 
vain eft'ort to drown out his companion — marched about the village 
whenever they could secure a following. The village drum was in the 
possession of the Democrats, and consequently not available for Whig 
celebrations. 

Among the local Whig speakers there were none so popular as 
Jacob (Jake) B. Miller. Jake was a classical scholar, and when the 
occasion demanded, could and did present his views in most polished 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 95 

language of the Queen's English. He was a capital mimic, and thor- 
oughly familial" with the vernacular of the native westerner. When 
addressing an assembly of this character, he used their own idiom and 
figures of speech made familiar in their daily life. If, as he sometimes 
did at the close of a harangue, he produced his fiddle and broke out 
with the Arkansaw Traveler, the whole assembly joined in a general 
breakdown and pow-wow, winding up by carrying Jake on their should- 
ers to the nearest bar for a smile. 

The windup of this campaign resulted in two public balls, in which 
both political parties heartily joined in making a grand success. The 
Whigs gave the Harrison Ball at the Washington House, on Tues- 
day, February 9, 1841; while the Democrats commemorated the exit 
of their President with the Van Buren Ball, at the Rockford House, 
on Wednesday, 3d of March, 1841, at 4 o'clock p. m. It is passing 
strange that I should have preserved my tickets of invitation to both 
these balls, to reproduce them which I now do verbatim et literatim, 
fifty years afterwards. The Harrison ticket was printed at the office 
oj the Rock Bivcr Express; the Van Buren ticket at the Rockford Star 
office, and both are bronzed. 

The ball room at the Washington House was superior to anything 
at that time in the State, and for many years after. It was 20 by 60 
feet, with two sets of joice, the upper set supporting the floor, of ash 
lumber, and elastic like a spring-board. I have never seen its equal 
for a dancing party. As illustrative of the absence of all animosity 
between the two late political antagonists, the desire that each should 
make a grand success, my father, rock-rooted, hardshell Democrat as 
he was, at the request of the Millers who built and kept the Washing- 
ton House, and who had little or no experience in affairs of this kind, 
took charge of preparing the meats and table arrangements for the 
banquet, and my mother of the pastry and table decorations. 

The ball came off as per program, the house being packed. 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 



fiarrisor) Qd^l, 



On irifh thr Dxun , 1,1 .Toil J,( unrini.fincd ! 

No ship (ill jiiDi-ii, irhi II Yiiiilli mill I'liasurc meet, 

To (iiiisr thr ijloiriiiij huiirs villi Jlyimj feeV 



THE undersigned solicit the company of 
at a Ball to l)e lield in lionor of tlie i^glal-doy of our 

PreSidcnt-EleCt, at tllC Washington House, in ROCliford, 

on Tuesday, February 9tli, 1841. 

MANAGERS. 

OSGAR TAYLOR, \ ( J. C. SCOTT, 

T. D. ROBERTSON, - Rockford. - JOHN GAIRNS, 

ALONZO PRATT, ) ( CHARLES HALL, 

C. WATERMAN, Sycamore; 
F. BUSS, Pleasant Grove; 
HORATIO HUNT, Freeport. 



J. c. Waterman, Newburg; 
D. M. BRISTOL, Belvidere; 
D. J. BUNDY, Beloit; 



Inspired by the grand success of their recent political foes, the 
Democrats determined to surpass them if possible, or in any event to 
have their administration go out in a blaze of glory. This was the 
ticket. 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 



VAN BUREN BALL 




HONOR TO WHOM HONOK IS DU 



'^_J/^>^iS- vPi>f>'C^T:z,-f^<^ 



■c^ 



^—^Z^a^-t:^^ ^d- ^ 



House, ROCKFORD, g^t^^./^^^ -^^^, .^/^ 

.i/.^/^^ y jl(lart;in Van Buren. 



^<2^ ^-^^-ci-a" /z^^e-f^e^i:/ ^z^tz^ 



D. S. HAIGHT, J. TRULY ShALEB, i PnnUfnrrl ' J" C. GOODHUE. CHA'S LATIMER. 
C. I. HoRSMAN. CHAS. CONRAD, |' '^OCKIOrQ. J jj ^ LOOMIS, F. BIERER. 

R. S. Malony. 1 J. M. Strode. ( pv,,-„.,o-r. F. Aldrich. / Joliet. 

L. A. DooLiTTLE, I R„,,,;fl„„„ M.O.Walker, f^"^'"^^*'- W.M. Jackson f Coral. 
H. Waterman, (■ iseniuere. Thompson CAmpbell, \ r^„^^^ 
B. F. Lawrence, J A. L. Holmes. \ "^'liena. 

A. R. Dodge, i nttawt. H. McKenney, / Madison. 
L. P. Sanger, \ '-"^^awa. ^ p Qj^^j^y^ (- Milwaukee. 

JNO. D. Winters, j- Elizabeth. Jno. M. Finch, {■ Stephensor 



Jehiel Day - Daysville. 



James LvBband, ^ Monroe. Julius M. Warren, \ Warrenville. 



Joseph Napier, ^ Naperville. James Campbell, ^Aurora. 

Henry Mayard, (- St. Charles. David Dunham, !- Geneva. Wm. Kirlball 



Chas. Waterman, / 



Wm. WiLKlSON. I 



Timothy Welt,s, f Sycamore, j^ ^ McKenney. C Dixon. l.q.Crocker |" Freeport 
Wm. B. Sheldon, / y.,, David Noggle / T,„i„it Orris Crosby, ; Ohio 
S. SToiGHTON. i'*'"'"^^^^^^^- Cha-sDuhgin. (' **^^°"- H. Shattuck. f Grove 



BEAUBIEN, JR., I K-i«kwolrpp *^ 

M. Layton. c KifekwaKee. ^^ 
Pecatonic. 



H. W. LEB'FINGW 
Meiuul E. Mack, 
Moses M. Strong, 



Amesville 
Harlem 



Mineral Point 



Millford. 



Thos. Coon, K Winnebago. 
Jno. Platt, j- TrasK's Ferry. Rufus Colton, 
13 



Eo. F. Ames, 

P. HVDE. 

H. Thurston 
Jno. W. Dyer f 

A. Brown, {- Grand De Tour. 
D. A. Blake, 
j- Coltonville, 



B. F. HOYT. / New- 
Jno. Steele, f bur;,'. 
T. H. T. Moss, ( Oregon 
W. W. Fuller, s Citj. 



y» EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

The celebration came off as per programme in the early evening 
of the third of March, 1841. Doct. Orris Crosby of Ohio Grove, Boone 
county, the oldest Democrat present, and Miss Mary A. Barrett of 
Harlem, fiance of the writer, the youngest democrat in the house, 
opened the ball. 

The doctor, who was spare, and six feet or more in hight, was 
clad in a blue broadcloth swallow-tailed coat with brass buttons, in 
the style of the twenties, an immense rolling collar extending up the 
back of his head, trousers four inches shorter than are now worn, red 
stockings and calfskin pumps, started the revelry with his favorite 
figure of Upper Reel; and the way the old Democi'at pigeon-winged 
as he swung corners and balanced to partner, was the envy of us 
youngsters. Down the outside one or more bars of music as the room 
available would allow and return ; down the center and return between 
the two lines of dancers ; cast off one couple ; swing .your partner and 
the opposite lady ; swing your partner and the lady at the head of tne 
set; balance to and swing your partner and repeat the figure. In af- 
ter years, Mary used to say she was in mortal fear during this dance 
the old Democrat would trip her up while executing the more elabor- 
ate steps in his pigeon-winging. 

In my scrap book I find a clipping from the Chicago Democrat, in 
which " Long John Wentworth " makes mention of this ball. 

"■ A Valuable Present. — We ought long ago to have returned 
our thanks to the landlord of the Rockford House and to the party 
which assembled there at the Democratic ball, on the 3d, for a large 
box of choice selections from the table provided for that occasion ; but 
the recent excitements have kept our mind in another direction. 
Among them we would mention the following, viz : 

1 Roast Turkey, 1 Bottle Champagne, 

1 Roast Chicken, 1 Large Sugar Rooster, 

1 Pyramid of Cake, 1 Cr-anberry Pie, 

6 Large slices of Cake, of different varieties. 

1 Mince Pie, About 2 lbs. Alamode Beef, 

About 3 tt)s. Rock River Cheese. 

And any quantity of little fixings embracing lozenges, candies, 
tarts, &c., &c. 

We would not forget to mention, however, a small flag, said to be 
carried by whatever lady happened to dance at the head, with the in- 
scription — ' Ex-President Van Buren, Col. Wentworth, and Rock 
River Democracy;' nor the many printed compliments selected by 
this and that person as appx'opriate to our condition and desert in life. 
One writes ' twenty Mary's were present on the occasion, besides some 
who were just as pretty, though they went by another name.' We 
say, give us Rockford yet for remembering editors." 

For a decade and more afterwards these two balls were mentioned 
by the participants, whenever they desired to refer to a big thing in 
the terpsichorean line. 



CHAPTER X. 

First Brick House on the West Side— First White Children Born in the County— Mrs 
Haight's Sister— The Charivari— Selden M. Church and Mary Preston— Their 
Wedding Turn-Out— Isaiah Lyon and Mary Hitchcoclf- Their Wedding Recep- 
tion—The De'il Himself Loose— Pandemonium— A Swinette— The Army Trail- 
Indian Camp— The Best Road on Earth— Prairie Grass— Red-Root— Massasau 
guas— The Hoosier Whip— Alexander Miller in 1838— Fishing— Waterfowl— Pig- 
eons — Deer — Jake Kite— His Rifle— Snuffs a Candle— To Oregon in 1845— Sylves- 
ter Scott's Mother Shoots a Deer- -Sylvester's Account of the Exploit. 

The first brick house on the west side was built by Doct. George 
Haskell and Isaiah Lyon on the northwest corner of State and Main 
streets, in the fall of 1838. The cellar was dug in August, and during 
the fall and winter the building was finished and occupied — two stories, 
with store and offices below and hall above ; the hall being used by 
the Baptist church for religious services. When the lot was staked 
out, Mr. Harvey H. Silsby, who is a house joiner and was then in the 
employ of Doct. Haskell, persuaded him to set the building back six 
feet from the line on both fronts. I have these items from Mr. Silsby 
in person, and the fine appearance of the north side of State street is 
owing to his good judgment at that early day. This building was 
quite generally known as the Winnebago House. Some time in the 
early fifties, it was refitted and first opened as a hotel by the late Isaac 
N. Cunningham, who made it one of the most popular hostelries in 
the country. 

It is stated, I think, in R. P. Porter's history of this county, that 
George E. Dunbar, now of Memphis, Tenn., was the first white child 
born in Winnebago county. I supposed that was the case, and have a 
faint recollection of so informing Porter. Some few years ago Mr. 
Dunbar called at my house, when I showed him a memoranda in pen- 
cil which my wife had obtained through the late Miss Jane Jackson, 
and which Mr. Dunbar said was correct. Although faint, this mem- 
oranda, which is in the chirography of a lady, is readily deciphered 
with a glass. It is as follows, and is here inserted as a matter of I'ec- 
ord : " February, 1836, Mrs. John B. Long introduced the first female 
child in Winnebago Co., which was Melissa J. The first male child 



LciG. 



100 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

boi"n was Ogden Hance, in what is now Pecatonica township." Miss 
Jackson was a sister of Mr. Dunbar's mother. Mr. Dunbar gave to 
my wife a cabinet photo of himself, which is now in the possession of 
Mrs. E. P. Catlin of 302 South First street. 

Tliis seems an opportune time in which to make a record of an- 
other early settler who has been incorrectly reported in the local 
press. Quite recently I saw a statement in one of the town papers, 
that Mrs. Haight's sister, a Miss Carey, was one of the persons pres- 
ent at the first religious meeting held in this county in 1835, at the 
house of Germanicus Kent. It goes to show how difficult it is to ac- 
curately remember names for fifty years, and more. The early settler 
who gave the item to the reporter is mistaken as to her name. I was 
present at the marriage of this young woman in Haight's log cabin. 
Her name was Abigal Stearns. I quote from the record of marriages 
in the county clerk's office : 

*•' April 5th, 1837, Samuel I. Corey was married to Miss Abigal 
Stearns. Certified. W. E. Dunbar, J. P." 

Writing of marriage and giving in marriage, brings to mind a 
custom adopted by the youngsters among the early settlers, which 
they borrowed from the French who peopled Kaskaski at a remote 
day — The Charivari. If the fellow upon this momentous event in 
his life didn't "come down," he must abide the consequences. On 
the other hand, if on the evening of May 20, 1845, (I get the date from 
my scrap book, ) the day when Selden M. Church and Mary Preston 
were joined in marriage, a charivari had been attempted, it wouldn't 
have been a healthy vmdertaking, as the jiarty would have been sum- 
marily squelched. At 1 p. m. sharp that day, I drove up to the front 
of the Rockford House with " Black Lucy," the handsomest horse in 
town, hitched in the shafts of an open buggy with wood axles, bass- 
wood dash, seat upholstered with a buffalo robe and clean harness — 
the best in town — from the livery of Tyler & Thurston, which equip- 
age I had in charge for the occasion and handed the reins to the 
Judge. He was followed as he drove off by the benedictions of the 
assembly. We had no shoes to throw after them, as they were re- 
quired for personal use, and rice had not yet come in vogue ; but God 
bless you's and our best wishes did follow in the wake of the disap- 
pearing vehicle. The bars of the Rockford and Washington Houses 
were open that afternoon and evening to all the acquaintances of the 
newly wedded couple, and were patronized to a moderate extent only; 
one cigar, the flavor moistened by a single drink sufficed. 

Isaiah Lyon and Mary Hitchcock were married March 31, lS-11. I 
also get this from my scrap-book. In fact I am largely indebted to 
this scrap-book which has been filled from time to time in past years 
without thought of ever using it for my present work. Miss Mary 



, EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 101 

Hitchcock was a most popular young- lady, as wei^e all ladies at the 
time, married or unmarried ; but Isaiah Lyon, her fiance, and Jona- 
than Hitchcock ("Old Funds") her father, were promising- subjects 
for a charivari, even had they " come down like a thousand of brick,'' 
which they failed to do in any way, and were given such a charivari 
as eclipsed all previous or succeeding- efforts in that line, having as 
participants parties in all ranks of life. My memory has recently 
been refreshed by a participant who was then, and is still a member 
in g-ood standing of the Baptist church to which Lyon then belonged, 
and to which he adhered through life. The charivari came off in 
front of the house No. 107 North First street, now occupied by Doct. 
E. J. Johnson as a residence. This house was built by Jonathan Hitch- 
coek, and was then new. The Baptist brother tells me in effect like 
this : ■' I had a hand in working up the charivari. Lyon had played 
several tricks on me during the summer before, and boy-like, I wanted 
satisfaction, and got in my work to bring it about. Charles Oliver 
worked it on the west side, and ' Mel ' Turner came in to let us know 
when Lyon came home from his wedding- trip, so we could hold our 
concert the evening of their return." My own particular duty for the 
occasion was to prepare fire-balls, and to gather material for bonfires. 

The concert came off as per programme, the weather proving ad- 
mirable for the purjjose. One fellow had a large dx"y goods box with 
the cover off, which he planted immediately in front of the house, and 
with a piece of scantling well resined, which he rapidly drew across 
the edges of this box, produced an unearthly screech as though the 
De'il himself had broke loose. The bonfires being well started, the 
Baptist brother disguised with a buffalo robe fastened about his waist 
and projecting well above his head, carrying a horse fiddle (a rattle) 
as big as he could swing, headed the motely procession. Horns, tin 
pans, cow-bells, drums, bars of steel, guns and every conceivable thing 
to make a noise were brought into requisition. Pandemonium wasn't 
a circumstance. Each man and boy on his own hook, and each striv- 
ing to outdo the other. 

During all this time the family in the house stood at the front 
windows apparently enjoying the scene which was brilliantly illumi- 
nated, as well as those outside. Finally the performers on wind in- 
struments became so exhausted they couldn't I'aise a squeak, when 
Nicholas ("' Nick ") Smith, a carpenter on the west side, and a genius 
from New Jersey, produced a new instrument of torture which he 
then and there dubbed a " Swinette." Followed by the i^egiment, he 
appeared on the scene, each man carrying under his arm as large a 
shoat as he could well handle — there were lots of 'em sleeping around 
every manure pile in town — while grasping the muzzle of the animal 
in his hand, when he i)roduced a high or a low note by opening or 



102 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

shutting- its mouth. When the pig became partially exhausted they'd 
cai'ry him into the bar-room and "tune up the Swinette," as Nick 
said, " with a glass of whisky. If pandemoneum reigned brfore, it 
was doubly intensified now with each pig- squealing in all the notes of 
the gamut. When the supply of small hog's gave out they caught the 
large ones, dragging- them by the hind legs as long- as they could utter 
a sound, and so ended the most noted charivari party of northern 
Illinois. 

When I arrived and for nearly two years after, the roads were 
termed trails, and between prominent points almost invariably follow- 
ed the Indian trail. General Scott's army trail made in 1832, when 
he followed Black Hawk's band to the head waters of the Rock, passed 
through the first ward. Stephen Mack, the Indian trader at the 
mouth of the Pecatonica was the guide. This trail met the river 
bank above the town at the dry run which is now bi-idged on North 
Second sti-eet, near the residence of H. H. Hamilton. It followed the 
bank of the river to the first creek above the town, when the wagon 
trail turned east on the south side of the creek and crossed the stream 
at the identical spot where the first bridge over the creek is now loca- 
ted. On the small piece of bottom land at this crossing, where it is 
surrounded on the north side by a high bluft', a permanent winter In- 
dian camp of some half dozen tepees had been located ; the site of each 
tepee being- plainly designated in 1837 by marks of fire and a low ring 
of earth. This was an excellent location, as there was shelter, wood, 
water, and an abundance of cotton wood along the creek for the ponies. 
The army trail crossed the bluff and met the Indian trail near the 
railroad track at the foot of the Big Bottom, where it followed the In- 
dian trail through the center of the prairie, crossing Willow creek 
eighty rods west of the bridge on the center road. The Indian trail 
was right beside — west — of the wagon trail and could plainly be seen 
for half a mile. These trails were as straight from point to point as 
a man would walk, and always chose the best location. 

A wagon trail on the prairie when it has worn through the sod, 
is the best road on earth in dry weather, being as smooth as a billiard 
table and elastic to the tread of a horse, without a stone in sight for 
mile after mile. As the travel was light and almost exclusively with 
two horses, a wagon trail like that between Rockford and Beloit had 
a comb of sod in the center on which the grass grew freely. This was 
the case on the Big Bottom as late as 1846. The prairie grass grew 
in small bunches or tufts, the blades of the grass having sharp edges 
which cut out the leather on the toes of a pair of boots rapidly, unless 
protected with a strip of tin tacked to the sole of the boot, a custom 
almost universal. There was a plant on the prairie called redroot 
from the color of the root which was nearly as dark as blood. The 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 103 

plant was about a foot high at maturity ; the roots being from half an 
inch to four inches in diameter, and tough as hickory, while being 
much more durable in the earth. These large roots would frequently 
bring a breaking team to a stand-still. There were lots of rattlesnakes 
(massasauguas) on the Big Bottom, but usually of smaller size than 
those found in the sloughs. In breaking the sod the *■' land " was laid 
off from six to ten rods wide depending on its length and the size of 
the team. As the sod was turned — usually two to two and a half inch- 
es thick — the snakes retreated to the center and were killed by the 
driver's whip. 

The Hoosier ox whip deserves special mention, the size of the in- 
strument depending on the muscle of its owner. I've seen a man con- 
trol a team of eight yokes of oxen, the leaders and wheelers only being 
fairly broken, with one of these whips. He would stand on the near 
side of the team about twenty-five feet away from the center of the 
line, and strike each ox within four inches of the spot where he in- 
tended to hit him, bringing blood at every blow. The stalk was from 
ten to fourteen feet long, with a lash of raw-hide half as long again, 
and a snapper of buckskin, the report being a sharp crack quite equal 
to a rifle. 

In my scrap book I find an article cut from the '' Forest and 
Stream,'''' many years ago, which I recognize as from the pen of Alex- 
ander Miller, who returned to Pittsbugh, Pa., in 1838, and was subse- 
quently joined there by his elder brother Jacob (" Jake ") B., where 
they became one of the leading legal firms in the city. It opens the 
subject of game in this locality in better language than I have at com- 
mand, and I make use of it : 

"• At the time of my arrival in Rockford two rival villages were 
competing for supremacy, and for the location of the county court 
house and other public buildings, one on the east and the other on 
the west bank of Rock river. The proposer of the proposed site on 
the east bank was one Haight ; of the west bank the firm of Kent & 
Brinkerhoff. After a long and angry controversy, the county seat 
was finally located on the west side of the luver." 

" At first I was completely enamored of the country ; the beauti- 
ful rolling prairies were studded all over with wild flowers, which 
grew most luxuriantly. One week the prairie would be all over white 
when a certain white flower would predominate ; a fortnight aftei-- 
wards it would be all blue when another flower would predominate, 
and so on throughout the whole summer, when each successive flower 
in its season would be in the ascendant, thus giving to us in regular 
succession all the various colors of the rainbow, between early sum- 
mer and autumn. My stay at Rockford was about six months, and 
having comparatively little else to do, I passed my time principally 



104 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

in the pleasures of hunting and fishing, in both of which that summei* 
I was eminently successful as any other novice might have been. It 
was about six years after the Black Hawk war, but even at that time, 
on traversing the prairie on the east side of the river, I could discern 
plainly and follow easily the track of our army, which marched along 
the river against Black Hawk and his army of Indian warriors, the 
wheels of the heavily laden baggage wagons having cut through the 
sod of the prairie. The counti-y was sparsely populated. East 
Rockford was a small village, and West Rockford a much smaller one; 
of course there were few sportsmen, but there were some. Nearly all 
the pioneers wei-e husbandmen, intent on digging a living out of old 
mother earth. As to game, the prairies were filled with pinnated 
grouse, the thickets with ruffed grouse ; and as for Rock river, it was 
literally alive with fish of the most magnificent proportions and of the 
greatest variety. Deer were abundant, as were wild geese and ducks 
in their seasons." 

"•For some time after my arrival in Rockford I amused myself by 
fishing with rod and line, killing all the bass and pickerel I desired. 
One evening after finishing my afternoon sport, and about to start for 
the village, I discovered lying on the bank a huge fishing pole, which 
had evidently been used by some stalwart rustic. The butt was a part 
of a hickory sapling, to which was spliced a long pole. It was of im- 
mense weight, considering the use for which it was intended. I affixed 
a line to this pole, baited it with a minnow, and fastening the butt 
firmly in the ground and covering it with great heavy stones, I threw 
the baited line into the river. On the next morning I returned and 
found that I had hooked a monster fish in the night ; the butt of the 
rod was sticking firmly in the ground where I had placed it, the rod 
was broken at the point where it was so strongly spliced, and the fish 
had made good its escape. At the time it was believed that this was 
the work of one of what we then called the Mississippi catfish, for it 
was supposed at that time that such immense catfish as were some- 
times found in Rock river could only be grown in the Mississippi." 

'' During the summer a friend of the writer's constructed a drop 
line, or as it is called in this section of country, a 'night line.' At- 
tached to it were perhaps forty or fifty hooks, which being baited, the 
line was stretched across the river in the evening. The next morn- 
ing my friend went to the river to raise his night line and to witness 
the success of his enterprise, when to his great surprise he discovered 
that the fish had literally carried off the whole line, and he never saw 
hook or thread of it afterwards. This was the first and last night line 
set in Rock river during my sojourn in that country. And yet an- 
other mode was resorted to in order to capture the fish in Rock river, 
which I am ashamed to relate, for it was so destructive and so very 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 105 

unlike the true sportsman. Verily, I believe that if old Isaac Walton 
had been present he would have hung every one of us up to a tree. 
Opposite the town of Rocklord, and above the rapids, the river bot- 
tom was smooth and free from all obstructions. We procured a seine 
of very considerable length, by a single draw of which we could sup- 
ply the whole population of the town with fish to last them several 
days. The modus operandi was as follows : The seine was placed on 
the stern of a skiff, one man plied the oars while another would drive 
the skiff up stream, thence toward the middle, and thence down and 
around until we would land on the shore a little distance below the 
starting point ; the seine was then drawn by parties at either end 
slowly toward the shore, and when within twenty or thirty feet of the 
bank the excitement began. Such a kicking and jumping and splash- 
ing ! There was the monster Mississippi catfish, weighing from fifty 
to eighty pounds, the huge sturgeon from three to four feet long, the 
' buffalo ' weighing as high as eighty pounds, ' red-horse ' and other 
fish without number. But we did not destroy all these. The tastes 
of the then residents of Rockford were very refined and delicate, and 
the three last named fish — bass, pickerel, and ' red-horse ' — were the 
only ones used. All the rest were consigned to the river again." 

Another unsportsmanlike mode of capturing fish which Mr. Mil- 
ler does not mention, was spearing, in which art nearly all the native 
frontiersmen were exj^erts. Thei-e was a small bayou just above State 
street on the east side, and at the mouth of Kent's creek on the west 
side, where liberal supplies were obtained of muskallonge, bass and 
pickerel with a spear, the fisherman usually operating with a canoe. 
I've seen a man stand on the gunwales of a light canoe-built for pas- 
senger sei'vice, and with a setting pole used on one side only of the 
craft, set it up over the rapids as fast as one could walk on the shore. 

Having never shot a game bird previous to my arrival in Rock- 
ford, the vast quantity of feathered game which I saw migrating north- 
ward in the spring of 1837, excited my unbounded surprise and admi- 
ration. Swans, geese, ducks, and all the variovis species of water fowl 
followed each other in endless succession up the valley of the river, 
while sand hill cranes, eagles, and other large birds of which no one 
seemed to have a knowledge, were navigating the air. The passenger 
pigeons made a roost in the timber east of what is now Marengo, in 
numbers sulficient to break down the limbs of trees. These birds when 
traveling to and from their feeding grounds passed over the little ham- 
let in countless millions, while "the woods were full of them." Our 
party were well provided with fire arms, a ten bore single barrel shot 
gun — the barrel forty inches long — being a part of my special baggage. 
The vsrood ducks raised their young in the groves immediately about 
14 



106 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

the town and all the game so abundant in after years were seen, with 
the exception of quail ; there were none here when I came. They fol- 
lowed the immigration, and were here in countless numbers from 1844 
to 1854. Deer were abundant. The first I saw was early in April, 1837, 
in the woods near the place where the State road meets the timber, 
where I encountered a drove of nine. The edges of the timber nearly 
all the way from Cedar Blutt' cemetery to the Kishwaukee, were a 
dense thicket where the deer could hide, and the few here who knew 
how to hunt them rarely failed to get a shot. The Mulford estate was 
a capital hunting ground for deer and ruffed grouse, as was the valley 
of Keith's creek. The prairie chickens multiplied more than ten-fold 
in five years, owing to the better food supply, as well as the ignorance 
of most of the new comers of the art of wing-shooting over a pointer, 
and the fact that the native western pioneer had a supreme contempt 
for the scatter gun. The most expert deer hunter I ever met was 
"Jake " Kite, who lived with "Old Spoors " on a claim in what is now 
Guilford, and for many years after owned and occupied by Solomon 
Wheeler. A few weeks after my arrival, I met Jake one Saturday 
afternoon in Bundy & Goodhue's store, as he sauntered into the room 
with his rifle on his shoulder and carefully set it in a corner of the 
room. Twenty minutes after he was reasonably mellow ; just sufficient 
to be talkative and good natured. The gun was a pill lock, the ham- 
mer when cocked standing at a right angle with the barrel, an inden- 
tation in the side of the barrel smeared over with tallow holding the 
pill, and carried a larger ball than was usual at that time ; it was as 
quick as the modern breech loader. There wasn't a particle of bright 
metal about it ; the muzzle sight of white bone fashioned by himself, 
while the rear sight was a straight bar with a slight V in the center. 
My boyish curiosity caused me to take the rifie in hand to examine the 
lock, having never before seen one like it. "Take care, bub," said 
Jake, " she's loaded," and he took it himself. "Where's the cap ?" 
" She don't use airy cap," and from one of the pockets of his hunting 
shirt he produced a quill partly filled with what I supposed to be onion 
seed, and explained the method of priming the arm, and that the tal- 
low smeared over the priming was to keep out moisture. " Wait till I 
get our rifle," and I soon handed him a finely finished piece, gorgeous 
in its silver mountings and engraving. Jake examined it with the eye 
of a connoisseur. " She's right smart, but them trimmings ain't worth 
shucks." " Is she loaded?" "Yes, all but the cap."' "Lets see you 
shoot her," and I followed him outside. "There bub. d'ye see the 
black spot on that tree'?" (pointing to one just below the Rockford 
House,) "let's see you spile it." Taking the wiping stick in my left 
hand and using it for a i-est while I knelt on one knee, I made a line 
shot four inches above the mark, much to my delight. " She's sighted 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 107 

for 18 to 20 rods, bub, you must draw a finer sight." "Now Jake, you 
try it," and he did. The muzzle of the rifle wabbled as Jake's body 
swayed to and fro under the influence of the liquor, but at the instant 
of the explosion he was as rigid as a statue. I ran to the mark, Jake 
following leisui-ely. I could find no trace of the bullet on the tree. 
"Look in the mark, bub," said Jake, and to my surprise I found the 
bullet hole there. Under Jake's instructions I learned during the sum- 
mer to draw a " fine sight," and with a dead rest, could make a fair 
showing with Jake himself in shooting at a mark. 

One of Jake's feats was to snuff a candle in the evening with a rifle 
ball, and the more intense the darkness the more easily he accomplish- 
ed it. A lighted candle is placed in a small box with one side re- 
moved and stepping off thirty paces from the front of the light, Jake 
rarely failed to extingush it. He explained it to me by saying that 
when he saw the mark, the front and rear sights, he pulled the trig- 
ger. It simply requires a quick finger on the trigger, and resolution 
not to pull until the three objects are in line. As the country became 
more populous, Jake Kite and kindred spirits were the first to migrate 
west. They could see the smoke from a neighboring chimney contam- 
inating the air, and were filled with a feeling of suffocation. Early in 
the spring of 1845, "Old Spoors," Jake Kite, a Mr. Jolly, with others 
from this vicinity, formed part of the advanced guard to Oregon. Mr. 
Jolly was not less than seventy years old when he started with a team 
of four mules, which he drove there from the foot of the Big Bottom 
to Oregon. 

While making notes and getting material together for a chapter 
relating to the game so abundant at an early day, I remembered that 
Sylvester Scott's mother once killed a deer with a rifle in the imme- 
diate vicinity of their log cabin in what is now Guilford, where she re- 
sided with her young family. I wrote to Sylvester for details of the 
event, to which he promptly responded. His reply was so character- 
istic, his pen pictures of pioneer life so true to the reality at the time 
of which he writes, that I wrote a second letter asking permission to 
publish his account of the deer killing, to which he readily assented. 
As I did not feel warranted in so doing, or like to make any change in 
the style of his description, I herewith append the latter, verbatim et 
literatim : 
Friend Thurston. 

Yours of the 12, at hand and finds me busily engaged in nursing 
the Grippe. I think I seldom have passed a more uneasy night than 
last night, am a little better to-day. but that is not saying much. 

For its cough and then sneeze," 

The most of the day ; 

Without comfort and grace. 

" In, the varied display; 

While you feel so disgusted 

You'r tempted to Swear 

That you do not feel better 

Mid'st THIS TERRIBLE TEAR — 



108 KARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

We have had our share of colds," Grippe" and Hog Cholare," but 
are able to be about: and I could relish a nice piece of Veneson," this 
morning "most Royally" inons" Thurston". Botsford," Says that 
Homer himself would not Recognized his own Poetry, after Syl" Scott 
coppied it. Rther hard on Scott, but" I will try and tell you my veri- 

son of the Deer " Killing " Nevertheless 

It was in the fall of 38th to the best of my recollection." that the 
event of Shooting that Deer occured. "Frosted " out of "Cold " Cat- 
taraug; (as this co " in the State of N Y. Was called "; from which we 
Emigrated to this co; We moved by Horse and wagon," taking us five 
weeks to accomplish the joiu'ney. our Route was first to Buffalo ". 
here we crossed the Niaggary River " at Black Rock " into Cannady; 
then to the Falls; "from here to Detroit," then to Michigan City:' 
then around the Lake to Chicago," and from Chicago" to the present 
CO of Winnebago. 111. 

Their was moi-e " hundred cent " ers " then," than Millienaires " 
in this CO. and you can rest assured." We were not running over with 
the nessessaries, of life " needed upon this muudame Sphere, a few fts 
of Hoosier Hog", (as we used to call them) was a luxary much covet- 
ed," and it answered a two-fold purpose," to Sop our Jenny Cake," in; 
and Lubricate the Spider," to Keep it from adhering unto— it. This 
much desired Article, consisted of, first," a Rine about half an inch 
thick." then a layer of gristly fat " of about the same thickness, after 
this came a succession of layers, of uncertain make up." terminating 
with the Ribs'; and insid requiremants;" "but with all its Swineish 
peculiarities ", it answered a purpose: and was successfully applied 
wherever necessity directed. But " there was other delicasies covet- 
ed by the Pioneer of these days ", these were made up of Game of va- 
rious kinds so abundant in those days. My Father " then a man in the 
prime of life," had little time to Hunt, and when he did," it would be 
only a few moments " at Sun Set," to pick a few Pheasants from their 
pearch for the night; or drop a Wild-Goose upon the Wing'; or a 
Prairie Chichen that ventnred to near his place of Labor. 

About a i of a mile from our log Cabin was a slough " where the 
wild Grass grew abundant," and we had mowed it to procure our Win- 
ters Hay. it was in Sept or Oct. and the young grass had started up 
fresh and green " and offered a sweet morsel to the numerous droves 
of Deer that roamed freely over Wood and prairie," in those Early 
day's. Mother was the Daughter of a Hunter, although Born in Cape 
May. CO N J. and at one time the owner of a valuable propperty in this 
CO. but as the hard times " after the War of 1812 came " he Mortgaged 
all to Jacob," Rigeway". of Phil'a. and moved into Penn". upon some 
of the tributary Streams of the Susquhanneh River, to engage in Raft- 
ing timber for the Market South, a live year sojourn in this place, 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 109 

gave Mother a lesson in the killing of large Game. Deer" Elk," 
Bear. Wolves & Panthers " hovered about their Wild Retreat;" and 
many a fine Specimen fell "" by the hand of David Johnson." in those 
Wild Regions of the Allegania Mountains ; and it was here she learned 
to use her Fathers ''Pet " Rifie, (and which is still kept by my Broth- 
er Daniel. Scott," of "Guilford: 

It was at the close of a beautiful Autumn day. the Pheasants could 
be Ifeen browsing on the tree tops " and Numerous flocks of Geese, and 
Ducks were flying past on their Way to River; and Pond. The Squir- 
el was nimbly running from tree to tree," and men was engaged in our 
Evening Chorus " so well remember by the hunter of those Days. 

Mother," told Brother and I. she would go and see if she could 
not kill a Deer, leaving our two Sisters with us; (the youngest but a 
few months old) she shouldered the Pet Rifle," and started for the 
meadow. But a short time elapsed," before the sharp crack of a Rifle 
rang out upon the Evening air," and shortly after the Schrill voice of 
a Woman, calling for some one to help her. She had droped the 
Deer " — a fine Doe," and it was struggling frantically about," "and a 
mortal fear Struck her, that " it might get away. She had no hunt- 
ing knife; and quickly reloading She fired a final shot into its head, 
that soon pvit all fear aside, the Scene of the shooting, was about 100 
rods E. of the Old log School House," where Cirus. Jenks. Kept School. 
You will remember this. Soloman. Greely " my Wife's Father; lived 
about the same distance North, upon hearing the Rifle, and Mother 
calling for help, he cought a Butcher Knife and hastened to the res- 
cue, the Deer was silent. Mother was excitedly watching the game, 
and the happiest Woman in America," just then. Father soon re- 
turned from the City of Forest's, "learned the facts," and the Deer 
was soon at the Cabin, and Dressed," cut up," and moi'e than one Fam- 
ily feasted upon "Venison Steak that Evening. 

Those were days of trials and happiness mingled together, most 
of the Dear ones" so "sacred to memory have gone to the land of 
Spirits, a few linger behind: but time flyes on Wings and we to will 
soon follow, as I write these recollections, my Dear " Mother comes to 
my side," and whispers " it is Well," my Son," " God Ruleth." 

I have read your articles with Interest, they are very correct " as 
far as I remember. Respectfully yours as Ever. 

Sylvester. Scott. 



CHAPTER XI. ' 

Deer Hunting in 1837— Buck-Fever— Quail by the Wagon Load— Price per Dozen- 
First Fresh Oysters— Quail Suppers— John Frink and The Hunters— Immense 
Numbers of Prairie Chickens— Three Hundred Shot Over One Dog— Thirteen 
Down— From Glasgow to Rockford to Shoot— Bird Dogs— Charley Pratt of Free- 
port— Seventeen Turkeys— Ike Stoneman's Tavern— A Glass of Gin— Tut Baker, 
Charley Waterman, Seth Farwell and Fred. Strocky of Freeport— Web Foot 
Rabbit— Poetry (?)— Various Game Birds— Conclusion— Acknowledgments. 

I do not recall a single instance where one of the town boys in 
1837-8 succeeded in securing a deer, although they often shot at them. 
Their usual hunting ground was from near the Richardson brick yard 
to the Mulford estate and south of that point. Most of the youngsters 
among the new comers became quite expert in shooting at a mark with 
a rifle, but at game in the woods, and more particularly at deer, they 
were afflicted with ''buck-fever," and while it is possible they may 
have wounded one, I never knew a deer to be brought in as a trophy. 
In the fall of 1837, a hunt was organized and sides chosen, each one 
selected having the privilege of providing a substitute. John Miller, 
father of the Miller boys, was captain of one side, and Henry Thurston 
of the other, both of them being too old and infirm to imrticipate per- 
sonally in the sport. - Jake Kite was my father's substitute, who 
brought in the only deer killed that day. Jake's relation to me of his 
successful shot is as vivid in memory as though it were yesterday. The 
locality was near the scene of Mrs. Scott's exploit. Jake was cautious- 
ly passing through a dense thicket when he heard the deer coming 
and dropped beside a log. As the animal approached he mounted the 
log and called out "halt!" The deer stopped instantly, and raising 
its head Jake could see the outline of his horns and neck through the 
brush, when he shot him through the neck. Following the trail for 
half a mile, he observed the deer began to stagger, when he sent out 
his dog, who soon had him down. This dog never left his heels ex- 
cept when ordered. "But Jake," said I, "Why didn't you put the 
dog on the trail at first?" "He'd a run five miles bub, if I'd a done 
that." My own experience in hunting deer is not flattering. The 
first trial I made was late in the fall of 1839. There came a fall of 
snow and I started for the head-waters of Willow Creek, armed with a 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. Ill 

single barrel ducking- gun, heavily charged with buck shot. Within 
half a mile of the present locality of the Scotch church, I ran into a 
drove of five, and while a fine doe stood about forty paces away for not 
less than two minutes, gazing and snuffing at a large bush which con- 
cealed me, I stood there with my heart in my throat, utterly uncon- 
scious I held a gun in my hands, and my mission that day was to kill 
a deer. A more clear case of "buck fever " was never developed. 

As previously stated, there were no quail here when I first came, 
but they followed the immigation closely. From 1844 to '52, they 
were here in countless numbers. Quite recently I heard a fellow — 
not a sportsman — boast of potting thirteen at one shot. I am happy 
to say I nevei" murdered them after that fashion, but with dog and 
gun gave the little beauties a chance for life. During the winter of 
1852-3, the season the railroad track first reached Rockford, quail 
were brought in barrels by the wagon load from Stephenson county 
and shipped east. After they acquired a commercial value they 
diminished lapidly in numbers. This, with a few severe winters, has 
in this locality caused them to have become extinct in recent years. 
In the early forties, quail were used in winter as a substitute for 
oysters in making soup. The country boys caught them in traps ; 
dressed and brought them in to barter for ammunition at a price not 
to exceed eighteen cents per dozen. We cooked them in a chafing- 
dish with an alcohol lamp, making with butter and spices, a most de- 
licious dish. The first fresh oysters received in the town was about 
the first of February, 1847. They were brought in the stage from De- 
troit. The incident is forcibly impressed on my memory from the 
fact there was no alcohol in the town, and Goodhue's whisky being a 
temperance drink, wouldn't burn in the lamp, which I finally filled 
and used with hot lard, though it smoked like blazes. Andrew Love- 
joy, who was the chef, pronounced the bivalves to be the famed 
"Shrewsbury oysters " of the Fulton Market in New York. 

We had most delicious quail suppers in the early winter months. 
Ah ! if I were set back forty-five years — a boy once more — I could ap- 
preciate the situation, for it never occurred to us the game would be- 
come nearly or quite extinct in our day. In November and December 
we went out in the afternoon in the immediate vicinity of the town 
for quail. On the east side, skirting the grove from the intersection 
of State and Kishwaukee streets to Buckbee's addition ; on the west 
side, from the fair grounds up the creek to the edge of the timber and 
around to the river. The surplus not required for the supper was dis- 
tributed among friends. I never knew an instance where feathered 
game was sold by the sportsman. In the evening we put up the shut- 
ters and locked the store door. The dogs knew this was preliminary 
to dressing the game and were on the alert. We skinned the game 



112 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

invariably, each dog- sitting in front of his master expecting the tit- 
bits — heads, hearts, lungs, etc.; when by chance or design, he gave 
another dog a morsel, there was a fight instanter. While the game 
was being dressed, others of the party were on a foraging expedition 
for bread. Many a time the good housewife, when looking for the 
staff of life, while preparing the matutinal meal, has discovered it had 
disappeared in the most unaccountable way, while at the same time 
her life companion had no appetite for breakfast, neither could he im- 
agine how the bread and sometimes the butter also, had taken flight. 
We had a gridiron specially made with long legs and handle, to lit the 
door of the box stove in the store; with a head of cabbage, a large box 
of sardines to made cole-slaw; butter, bread, vinegar, etc., a large 
platter on which to serve the game, and appetites sharpened by the 
exercise, the feast which followed was fit for the Gods ; the dogs 
meanwhile whining with excitement, each one keeping close beside 
his master and asking in plain dog language for his share of the ra- 
tions. In those days the New York and Boston drummers came west 
before the close of navigation, remaining in this region making col- 
lections during the winter. These fellows could always be relied upon 
at such occasions, for all the sardines and champagne we chose to 
make way with ; this last commodity being an indulgence our finances 
would not allow. 

There was no town in the state outside of Chicago, where there 
was so many wing shots and trained bird dogs, as there was in Rock- 
ford. The stage passengers dined here, and fifty miles away were told 
during the shooting season, they would have a game dinner at Rock- 
ford. Mr. John Frink of the stage firm of Frink & Walker, a most 
able business man, was disgusted with the hunters he encountered 
here when making his trips over the line ; characterizing us as a set 
of loafers, and the mass of them were as a matter of fact. Mr. Frink 
said those he met in Chicago were conversing of the crop, and future 
prices for wheat. In Galena, it was the out-put and price for lead ; 
when he got to Rockford, about all he heard was "my dog stood with 
his tail on a dead level with his nose, while Jim's dog backed with his 
tail in the air," when another fellow would remark, " my dog's tail 
has become raw, and I'm plastering it with tar !" Mr. Mai-tin O. 
Walker, the other partner of the firm, was as devoted to the gun as 
any of us, and when business called him here during the season, had 
his gun with him, to the great annoyance of Mr. Frink. 

The number of pinnated grouse from 1846 to '50, in Winnebago, 
Boone, and Stephenson counties was prodigious. I've seen no account 
in recent years, where game birds were so plentiful, except the quail 
in San Diego county, California. I knew a company of nine, two only 
being expert shots, to go out in 1846, on Bonus Prairie, Boone county, 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 113 

who brought in over 300 chickens. As they had but one dog-, they 
formed a line across a piece of low ground, traveling some twenty-five 
feet apart, and walked up the game for a mile and one-half. One 
familiar with the difficulty in finding a dead bird in grass knee high 
without the aid of a dog, may realize how many they actually shot. 
At 4 o'clock one afternoon in August 1848, Andrew Brown of the 
Rockford House and myself, went out on the west side, driving across 
the Garrison place to the Rockton road. Andrew dropped me about 
half a mile north of the corner now occupied by Dan. Carney, beside 
a piece of millet containing perhaps two acres, while he went on half 
a mile farther. After loading my gun^a double barrel — and adjust- 
ing game bag, powder flask and shot belt, I got over the fence, when 
the dog came to a point within ten feet of me. I shot thirteen there, 
having them all down at one time. In the meantime, Andrew hear- 
ing the fusillade, came back and put his dog in on the opposite side 
of the field. In less than one hour from the time I got out of the 
buggy, we had forty. On .the Big Bottom just above the pickle farm 
now occupied by Mr. Snow, I've had nine down at one time with a 
single barrel gun. One day in August 1845, which was the year I 
first shot at game over a pointer, .lune & Turner's circus was to ex- 
hibit in the town; Judge Blackstone, who kept the Washington 
House, got me to take his two dogs the afternoon before the show ar- 
rived and secure a supply of chickens for the table. I left town after 
dinner with the dogs — pointers and well trained — drove to Milford, 
where "Len " Fountain joined me. We hunted from his wagon shop 
down stream on the river bottom, and when we arrived at the Dixon 
road, less than two miles, had fifty-two chickens and a bittern. I 
have known a party with seven guns to go out for an all day hunt on 
the low lands just below the mouth of the Killbuck, who had over a 
hundred birds stolen from their wagon which they never missed. 

Some of the British army officers from Quebec, usually came to 
Chicago to shoot grouse during the season, finding an abundance of 
game within sight of the city. In 1849, two young gentlemen from 
Glasgow, Scotland, came here expressly to shoot grouse, finding quar- 
ters at the Rockford House ; one of them hunting with Andrew Brown, 
the other with me. They both declared there was nothing like it in 
Europe, and also that out- dogs were as well trained for the game we 
hunted, as any to be found in the old country. Of dogs, we never had 
any trouble to raise them, and they had all the stamina and hunting 
sense possible in the animal. I believe the offspring of trained pa- 
rents will be better hunters, and more easily trained than if the case 
were otherwise, particularly so if the mother is hunted while carry- 
ing her young. My own favorite dog was a "dropper," and for all 

15 



114 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

sorts of g-ame, it would be difficult to find his equal. I could stand in 
the centre of an eighty acre lot and send him over any portion I chose 
by motion of my hand. He was a capital retriever, but in a hot day 
soon became heated. In my opinion for a bird dog only, the pointer 
is par excellence the king, and he may be trained for all game found 
in this latitude. Capin's dog would neither get over a fence or enter 
standing corn unless ordered. This dog would go around a field of 
corn, enter the grain and flush the birds, driving them towards his 
master. Old Charley Pratt, of Freeport, had a dog who would do 
this and more. This dog would take the trail of a deer, and if he 
found the animal hid in a thicket, would go around him and drive the 
deer in the direction of his master. Both these dogs were pointers. 

A chapter on game in this locality at an early day, would certain- 
ly be incomplete which failed to mention Charley Pratt. He was the 
best wing shot I ever saw handle a gun, and could readily defeat the 
best of us whenever he set himself about it. He was a most accom- 
plished musician, playing for balls about the country during the win- 
ter, and hunting in the summer and fall months, never performing 
any manual labor in his life. He once shot in the early fall, seventeen 
■wild turkeys within two miles of Freeport. The birds were about two- 
thirds grown. He made the dog flush the flock, and then picked them 
up as though they were quail. He made his home at "Ike " Stone- 
man's tavern on Galena street, never paying a cent in money for the 
shelter given him for nearly two decades. Poor old Charley ; the 
locomotive destroyed his only avocation in life, and he was unable to 
adapt himself to the changed conditions. He died in 1870, aged about 
75 years, and the Freeport boys of early days, gave him a respectable 
burial. I last saw him one exceedingly warm morning in July 1868, 
when I met him at the foot of a flight of stairs on Stephenson street. 
It was evident he had just crawled out for the day, and had not finish- 
ed his toilet, as bits of straw were distributed through his hair and 
beard. He grasped my hand with much emotion while tears coursed 
down his cheeks; we had not met in nearly a decade. "Charley," 
said I, "• with your long residence in Freeport, your intimate acquaint- 
ance with its people, its highways and by-ways, have you any knowl- 
edge of a locality where we two may each procure a class of gin V" 
He sat down on the stairs behind him, dropped his head in deep med- 
itation, finally turning up his kindly face to meet my gaze, when he 
replied, " I think I have," and started out on the street, bringing up 
in the basement of Fry's block. 

We had an original song in the forties, common to Rockford and 
Freeport alike, taking in all the local events of the two towns, from 
old "Tut" Baker of Freeport, who did not know the alphabet, sit- 
ting in the corner of a worm fence, and wearing an immense pair of 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 115 

green spectacles while pretending to read a newspaper, and Charley 
Waterman and Seth Farwell, personating an old Irishman and woman 
from New Dublin, going to Fred Strocky's store on Stephenson street, 
to barter a basket of eggs for groceries. If there was anything in a fel- 
low's past life, or like to happen in the near future which he would 
have preferred to keep shady, it was pretty sure sooner or later, to 
come out in this song. We were a jolly, happy crowd, intent on the 
pleasure of to-day with but little care for to-morrow, and what we did 
not get of the good things of this life within reach, was scarcely worth 
looking after. It would require the eloquence of Martin P. Sweet 
and the humor of Seth Farwell to do the subject justice ; but present- 
ly, along came the locomotive, and all this and the game disappeared. 
■Of this song which eventually grew to more than forty verses, all but 
a few have faded from my memory, the most of them pertaining to 
Stephenson county and Charley Pratt. It appears that before Chai'- 
ley came to Freeport, he was one of a company of market hunters who 
used to go to some of the islands in Lake Erie to shoot ducks. He 
once boarded where the housewife had been so unfortunate at some 
time in her life, as to have fallen into the fire and burned her face, 
making a scar which pulled one of her eyelids down, and she was 
popularly known as "'old Tear Eye." There is some sort of weed 
grows there called "spice-foot," from which they used to make tea. 
She once gave him for supper what he supposed was stewed rabbit 
and he didn't discover it was a muskrat, until he got hold of one of the 
paws, which he held up and asked her " what sort of a rabbit that 
was?" to which she replied, "a web-foot rabbit." This event in his 
life was commemorated in the song, as were others. I presume the 
reason I remember these verses, is that Andrew Lovejoy and myself 
composed them with much trial and tribulation, while we were camped 
In the timber near the mouth of Richland creek above Freeport. 

Old Pratt he is a great musician, 
He spends the summer in hunting and fishin', 
But when the Autumn it does come back, 
He's in the ball room dressed in black. 
Chorus — Buffalo girls won't you come out to-night? 

Old Pratt he went down to Sandusky Bay, 
He hunted coots eggs every day. 
On web-foot rabbits and spice-foot tea, 
Pratt and old Tear Eye had a spree. 
Chorus — Buffalo girls won't you come out to-night? 

Old Charley, who was with us in camp, evolved the following : 

Andrew hunts with a d — d big gun, 
He shoots his deer while on the run, 
He aims at the heart as they do pass, 
But never brings them to the grass. 



116 EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 

Freeport readers who desire to learn more of this song, are re- 
ferred to the Hon. David H. Sunderland. 

There was a multitude of water foul at an early day, but we had 
little success in hunting them. The modern method of using decoys 
never occurred to us. Had we used the tactics now in vogue, the bags 
would have been fabulous. I have no recollection of killing but one 
goose with a shot gun, although I frequently got them with a rifle. 
In the spring, the ponds along the Killbuck were fairly black with 
ducks and geese. Turkeys were plentiful in the timber on the Peca- 
tonica bottoms, but elsewhere in this county were seldom found. 
Charley Pratt and a Mr. Jackson, also of Freeport, were expert call- 
ers and frequently made good bags, but I never got but two ; one in 
the thicket on the site of Thomas Scott's coal yard, the other in the 
timber above Freeport. Sand hill cranes — quite equal to a turkey — 
were common, but like the geese, could only be shot with a rifle. 
The long bill curlew disappeared more than forty years ago. They 
were here in great numbers up to about 1846, and were excellent for 
the table. There was a small bird which at that time was called a 
plover, that came in the spring in countless numbers just before the 
grass started. They fairly covered the earth where the prairie had 
recently been burned over, but could only be approached with a team. 
A few were shot, and we might have made large bags but for the ex- 
pense of ammunition, a cash article, of which we were deficient. 
There was no game law at the time of which I write, and it would not 
have been respected had one been in force. No farmer objected to 
hunting on his land, neither did we abuse the privilege. We opened 
the rail fences surrounding large fields when we so desired, and re- 
placed them in good condition. I came to the conclusion long ago, 
that in a game country, the proper time to shoot it, is when it may 
be made useful regardless of the season. There is no dish more pala- 
table than a young quail or chicken broiled, when its bones may be 
eaten with the flesh. We often found early coveys in this condition 
the first week in August. 

In concluding these " Reminiscences," I desire to say they are 
true, and also original except where otherwise stated. Whatever of 
merit or censure they deserve, belongs to me alone. I have not ex- 
hausted the subject by any means, and further, never contemplated 
writing a history. I was induced to make this attempt as "one of 
the old guard," and while I write, cannot recall a single individual 
who was here when I first came, that would be likely to make the at- 
tempt. I often found my memory refreshed as the work progressed 
while consulting with old-timers, all of whom with rare exceptions, 
willingly gave all the aid in their power. Mr. Edward H. Baker has 
a mass of matter pertaining to the early history of the county, treat- 



EARLY DAYS IN ROCKFORD. 117 

ing mostly of affairs I have not noticed, which is authentic, and I 
trust may soon be published. To myself, the most surprising thing 
in this work, is, that with my training and avocations in life, I should 
have consented to publish it. I have no apology to offer for the style, 
and to the critic, will only remark, '' where ignorance is bliss," etc. 

I am under obligations for information and assistance in divers 
ways, to the following among others : 

To Mrs. Charles H. Spafford and her son Charles H. Spafford, .Jr.; 
Mrs. John H. Sherratt and her sisters, the Misses Wight. The Hon. 
R. R. Hitt ; Miss Mary E. Holmes ; Doct. D. S. Clark ; Mrs. Harriet 
Hard of Guilford ; Henry N. Baker ; Mr. and Mrs. .John Lake ; Lewis 
B. Gregory ; James B. Howell ; S. D. Gregory of Cherry Valley ; 
Edward H. Marsh ; Howard D. Frost ; James M. Turner ; George H. 
Dennett ; Parson K. Johnson of Mankato, Minn.; William H. Tinker 
of St. Paul, Minn.; Bradford McKenney of Ogle Co.; Edward Mulford; 
John Nettleton of Los Angeles, Cal.; William A. Manning of Santa 
Barbara, Cal.; Levi Moulthrop ; Ephriam Wyman ; Phineas Howes; 
Charles Waterman and David H. Sunderland of Freeport, 111.; Mrs. 
Catherine F. Holland of Cedar Rapids, Iowa ; H. H. Robinson ; Doct. 
A. M. Catlin ; and to E. A. Kirk. This last old timer— he preceeded 
me exactly one week — has the most remarkable memory of any whom 
I encountered while seeking for information, or to confirm or i-eject 
some incident brought out, as I was never in a single instance disap- 
pointed in my expectations. 

JOHN H. Thurston. 




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I SPORTING, AND OTHERWISE, | 

I Early Days in RocKroRD. I 




JOHN n. TnURSTON. 



FOR SALE BY 

B. R. WALDO, ... - 414 East State Street, 
H. H. Waldo, - - - - 3(>1 West State Street, 

ROCKFOKD, ILLINOIS. 



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